Les diaboliques (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1955) / Susan Hayward.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Hayward, Susan, 1945-

Contributor:

Gotham Book Mart Collection (University of Pennsylvania)

Series:

French film guides series

The French film guides

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Diaboliques (Motion picture : 1955).

Penn Provenance:

Gotham Book Mart (former owner) (Gotham Book Mart Collection copy)

Physical Description:

117 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm.

Place of Publication:

Urbana : University of Illinois Press, 2005.

Summary:

Les Diaboliques (The Fiends) was a top grossing film in 1955. Clouzot shrouded his film in mystery, beseeching his audience not to give away the ending. He also radically changed the original story of Boileau and Narcejeac's novel (Celle qui n'etait plus), heterosexualising the original lesbian plot. His film demonstrates how to imply, rather than show, horror, keeping the spectator in a state of continued suspense, only releasing us in the few final frames. Fifty years later, Les Diaboliques still intrigues perhaps due to its excessive ambiguities and numerous plot twists that make it a film noir to end all films noirs, and not least the great performance of Simone Signoret.

In this enjoyable and challenging film stuy Susan Hayward, leading writer on French cinema, sets Les Diaboliques against the political culture of its time and demonstrates the importance of Clouzot as a master of the thriller genre. She gives an illuminating in-depth textual analysis of the film and presents a comparison with its US remake which, juxtaposed with the original film book, highlights the great staying power of Clouzot's version, still a popular film with international audiences half a century after its premiere.

Contents:

Henri-Georges Clouzot (1907-1977): the man in focus 1

1 Production contexts 13

Obtaining the rights and adapting the novel 13

Casting 16

The technical team 19

2 Plot, camera, characterisation 29

Plot structure 29

Camerawork 36

Characterisation 38

3 Texts and intertexts: what kind of film is this - noir, queer, political? 41

4 Sequence analysis 63

Setting the scene (4m. 30s.) 63

'Murder' sequence - Niort (14m. 47s.) 73

Terrorising Christina (6m. 40s.) 83

5 Not even reinventing the wheel: the 1996 remake - Diabolique 93

6 Critical reception of Les Diaboliques 100

Cahiers du cinema and questions of genre 101

International reviews 104

Accentuating the positive: performances to die for 107

Conclusion: Clouzot the auteur-philosopher and auteur-monster 111

Appendix 2 Henri-Georges Clouzot filmography 115.

Notes:

"This edition produced by joint arrangement of I.B. Tauris & Co. and the University of Illinois Press"--T.p. verso.

Includes filmography (pages [115]-117), bibliographical references (page [118]).

ISBN:

0252030893

0252073304

OCLC:

60373630

Publisher Number:

9780252030895

9780252073304