René Clair facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
René Clair
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René Clair and Erik Satie, 1924
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René-Lucien Chomette
11 November 1898 Paris, France
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| Died | 15 March 1981 (aged 82) |
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| Years active | 1924–1976 |
René Clair (born René-Lucien Chomette; November 11, 1898 – March 15, 1981) was a famous French filmmaker and writer. He first became well-known in the 1920s for directing silent films. These movies often mixed comedy with amazing fantasy stories.
Later, he made some of the most creative early sound films in France. He then worked in the UK and USA for over ten years. After World War II, he returned to France. His later films were known for being elegant and clever. They often showed a fond, old-fashioned view of French life. In 1960, he was chosen to join the Académie française, a very important French group for arts and sciences.
Some of Clair's most famous films include The Italian Straw Hat (1928), Under the Roofs of Paris (1930), Le Million (1931), À nous la liberté (1931), I Married a Witch (1942), and And Then There Were None (1945).
Contents
René Clair's Early Life and Start
René Clair was born and grew up in Paris, France. He lived in the lively Les Halles area, which he always remembered fondly. His father sold soap. René also had an older brother named Henri Chomette.
René went to two well-known schools, Lycée Montaigne and Lycée Louis-le-Grand. In 1914, he was studying philosophy. One of his friends back then was Raymond Payelle, who later became the actor and writer Philippe Hériat.
In 1917, when he was 18, René served as an ambulance driver in World War I. He had to leave the army because of a back injury. The terrible things he saw during the war deeply affected him. He wrote about these feelings in a book of poems called La Tête de l'homme, but it was never published. After the war, he became a journalist for a newspaper called L'Intransigeant.
René Clair's Film Career
René Clair met the singer Damia and wrote some songs for her. She convinced him to visit Gaumont studios in 1920. A film was being cast there, and René agreed to play a main role in Le Lys de la vie. He started using the stage name René Clair. After this, he got several other acting jobs, including one in Parisette for Louis Feuillade.
In 1922, he expanded his journalism career. He became the editor of a new film section for a magazine called Théâtre et Comœdia illustrés. He also visited Belgium. There, his brother Henri introduced him to director Jacques de Baroncelli. René then worked as Baroncelli's assistant on several films.
Silent Film Success (1924–1934)
In 1924, René Clair got his first chance to direct a film. This happened with help from producer Henri Diamant-Berger. His first film was Paris qui dort (The Crazy Ray), a short, funny fantasy.
Before this film was even shown, Francis Picabia and Erik Satie asked Clair to make a short film for their Dadaist ballet Relâche. He made Entr'acte (1924). This film made Clair a leading figure in the artistic movement of the time.
His next two films also featured fantasy and dreams. But in 1926, Clair tried something new. He joined Films Albatros to direct a drama called La Proie du vent (The Prey of the Wind). This film was very popular.
He stayed at Albatros for his last two silent films: Un chapeau de paille d'Italie (An Italian Straw Hat) and Les Deux Timides (Two Timid Souls) (both 1928). In these films, he tried to turn funny plays by Labiche into silent movies. While at Albatros, Clair met designer Lazare Meerson and cameraman Georges Périnal. They became important partners for him for the next ten years.
By the end of the silent film era, Clair was seen as one of the greatest filmmakers. He was mentioned alongside famous names like Griffith, Chaplin, Pabst, and Eisenstein. Clair wrote all his own scripts and paid close attention to every part of filmmaking, even the editing. This made him one of the first French directors to be seen as a true auteur (a filmmaker with a strong personal vision).
Exploring Sound in Films
At first, Clair was unsure about adding sound to films. He called it "an unnatural creation." But then he realized how creative sound could be. He believed the soundtrack should not just copy what was happening on screen. Words and pictures, he thought, should not be too closely linked. Dialogue didn't always need to be heard.
Between 1930 and 1933, Clair explored these ideas in his first four sound films. He started with Sous les toits de Paris (Under the Roofs of Paris). Then came Le Million (1931), À nous la liberté (1931), and Quatorze juillet (Bastille Day) (1933).
All these films showed a warm and perfect view of working-class life. They helped create a popular, romantic image of Paris that was seen all over the world. These movies were made at the Epinay Studios for Films Sonores Tobis.
When Charlie Chaplin made Modern Times in 1936, some parts looked very similar to scenes in À nous la liberté. The company Tobis sued United Artists, who produced Chaplin's film, for copying. Clair was embarrassed by this. He felt he owed a lot to Chaplin's spirit and refused to be part of the lawsuit.
After his early sound films were very successful, Clair faced a big problem. His next film, Le Dernier Milliardaire (The Last Billionaire) (1934), was not liked by critics and didn't make much money. While in London for the film's British premiere, he met Alexander Korda. Korda offered him a contract to work in England. Clair accepted, starting a long time away from making films in France.
Working Abroad (1935–1946)
Clair's contract with Korda's London Films was for two years and included three films. Because his English wasn't perfect, he worked with American writer Robert E. Sherwood on his first film, The Ghost Goes West (1935). This was a funny fantasy about differences between American and European cultures. Clair and Sherwood became good friends.
In January 1936, Clair visited America for two weeks to check out future job options. He still planned to stay with Korda. However, Korda didn't like Clair's next script, so they stopped working together. Clair only made one more film in England, Break the News (1938), a musical comedy with Jack Buchanan and Maurice Chevalier.
Clair returned to France and tried to make another film there in 1939, called Air pur. It was meant to celebrate youth and childhood. But World War II started, and filming stopped. In May 1940, Jean Giraudoux, who was in charge of information, suggested that filmmakers move their work to southern France. If needed, they could even set up a French film center in the United States.
With this plan in mind, Clair and his family, along with Julien Duvivier, left for America. But by the time he reached New York, the plan had fallen apart. He went straight to Hollywood, where several studios wanted to hire him.
He made his first American film for Universal Studios, The Flame of New Orleans (1941). But it didn't do well financially, and for a while, Clair's directing career was uncertain. After more than a year, his next film was I Married a Witch (1942), followed by It Happened Tomorrow (1944). Both of these did quite well. Then came And Then There Were None (1945), which was a huge success, even though it was perhaps the least "personal" of his Hollywood movies. Each of Clair's American films was made for a different studio.
In 1941, the French government at the time took away Clair's French citizenship, but this was later changed back. Also in 1941, he learned that his brother Henri Chomette had died in France from polio. In 1943, he planned to go to Algeria to help organize a film service for the army. However, the money for the project was taken away just as he was about to leave. In July 1945, he went back to France for a short visit. He finally returned for good in July 1946, after signing a contract with RKO to make his next film in France.
His time in America allowed him to develop his unique style of funny fantasy in several successful films. However, some felt that he had less control over his work there and that his American films weren't as good as his earlier French ones. Clair himself felt that working for the well-organized American studios allowed him to work in ideal conditions. He said, "Despite the rules of the American system, it is possible, if one wishes, to take responsibility. In my four Hollywood films I managed to do what I wanted."
Return to France (1947–1965)
Clair's first film after returning to France was the romantic comedy Le silence est d'or (Silence is Golden) (1947). This film was set in 1906 and fondly remembered the early days of French filmmaking. Its story also played with ideas from Molière's play L'École des femmes. Clair thought it was one of his best films after the war.
Other films also drew inspiration from famous stories: La Beauté du diable (Beauty and the Devil) (1950) was inspired by Faust. Les Grandes Manœuvres (1955) was inspired by Don Juan. In these two films and Les Belles de nuit (Beauties of the Night) (1952), the main actor was Gérard Philipe. He became a friend and a favorite actor for Clair.
Porte des Lilas (1957) was a more serious film. It was set again in a popular part of Paris with its interesting residents. The singer Georges Brassens was convinced to act in this film, which was his first and only movie role.
During the 1950s, new French film critics and directors appeared. They were tired of the old ways of making films. Clair found himself criticized as a symbol of cinéma de qualité, or "cinema of old men." They felt his films were too nostalgic. His position as an "establishment" figure was further confirmed when he was elected to the Académie française in 1960.
Although he continued to make a few more comedies, like Tout l'or du monde (All the Gold in the World) (1961), they were not well received. He made his last film, Les Fêtes galantes (The Lace Wars), in 1965.
Writing and Other Work
René Clair started his career as a journalist, and writing remained very important to him. He spent more and more time writing in his later years. In 1926, he published a novel called Adams. It was about a Hollywood star who couldn't tell the difference between what was real and what wasn't.
He sometimes wrote other fiction, like La Princesse de Chine and Jeux du hasard. But many of his books were about cinema, including his thoughts on his own films. Besides many magazine articles, his main books were:
- Adams. (Paris: Grasset, 1926).
- Réflexion faite. (Paris: Gallimard, 1951).
- La Princesse de Chine, suivi de De fil en aiguille. (Paris: Grasset, 1951).
- Comédies et commentaires. (Paris: Gallimard, 1959) [includes 5 of Clair's screenplays].
- Discours de réception à l'Académie française. (Paris: Gallimard, 1962).
- Tout l'or du monde. (Paris: Gallimard, 1962).
- Cinéma d'hier, cinéma d'aujourd'hui. (Paris: Gallimard, 1970).
- L'Étrange Ouvrage des cieux, d'après The Dutch Courtezan de Jon Marston. (Paris: Gallimard, 1972).
- Jeux du hasard: récits et nouvelles. (Paris: Gallimard, 1976).
Clair also worked in other media. In 1951, he directed his first radio show, Une larme du diable. In 1959, he directed a play by Musset called On ne badine pas avec l'amour. Gérard Philipe gave one of his last performances in this play before he passed away. In 1972, Clair directed Gluck's opera Orphée for the Paris Opéra.
Personal Life
In late 1924, while working on a theater show called Ciné-sketch, René Clair met a young actress named Bronja Perlmutter. She later appeared in his film Le Voyage imaginaire (1926). They got married in 1926, and their son, Jean-François, was born in 1927.
René Clair passed away at home on March 15, 1981. He was buried privately in Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois.
René Clair's Legacy
René Clair's reputation as a filmmaker changed a lot during his lifetime. In the 1930s, he was widely seen as one of France's greatest directors, along with Renoir and Carné. But later, his films, which were often very artistic and not always realistic, became less popular.
His early experimental films, especially Entr'acte, made him temporarily famous and had a surrealist (dream-like) influence that stayed in much of his comedy work. However, it was how cleverly he handled the arrival of sound in films that showed his true originality. His first four sound films brought him international fame.
Clair's years working in the UK and USA made him even more widely known. But his style and themes didn't change much during this time. Some critics have noticed a new maturity and deeper emotion in the films he made after returning to France. These films often had a feeling of sadness, but they still kept the elegance and wit that his earlier work was known for.
However, in the 1950s, new critics and filmmakers appeared. They were part of the French New Wave movement, especially those connected with the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma. They found Clair's work old-fashioned and too academic. François Truffaut wrote harshly about him after seeing The Flame of New Orleans. He said, "We don't follow our elders in paying the same tribute to Renoir and Clair. There is no film by Clair which matches the invention and wit of Renoir's Tire au flanc.... Clair makes films for old ladies who go to the cinema twice a year."
André Bazin, the founder of Cahiers, gave a more balanced opinion. He said, "René Clair has remained in a way a film-maker of the silent cinema. Whatever the quality and importance of his recent films, expression through the image always predominates over that of the word and one almost never misses the essence if one can only vaguely hear the dialogue."
In a special issue of Cahiers du Cinéma in 1957, Clair received one of his most positive reviews. It said he was "A complete film author who, since the silent era, has brought to the French cinema intelligence, refinement, humour, an intellectual quality that is slightly dry but smiling and in good taste.... Whatever may follow in his rich career, he has created a cinematic world that is his own, full of rigour and not lacking in imagination, thanks to which he remains one of our greatest film-makers."
Such high praise has been rare since then. The very artistic and self-contained nature of Clair's films, his focus on carefully prepared scripts, and his choice to film in studios instead of real locations made him different from newer film trends. It's interesting that some people see François Truffaut as the true successor to Clair in French cinema, even though they often disagreed.
René Clair's Filmography
Feature Films
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Short Films
- Entr'acte (1924)
- La Tour (1928) (documentary)
- Forever and a Day (1943) (segment "1897")
- La Française et l'Amour (1960) (segment "Mariage, Le")
- Love and the Frenchwoman
- Les Quatre Vérités (1962) (segment "Les Deux Pigeons")
- Three Fables of Love
Television Work
- Les Fables de La Fontaine (1964) (episodes "?")
Awards and Honors
René Clair received many important national honors in France. These included Grand officier de la Légion d'honneur, Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres, and Grand-croix de l'ordre national du Mérite. In 1953, he won the Grand Prix du cinéma français, a major French film award.
In 1956, the University of Cambridge in England gave him an honorary doctorate.
In 1960, he was elected to the Académie française. He was not the first filmmaker to receive this honor, but he was the first to be chosen mainly because of his work as a filmmaker. In 1994, the Académie created the Prix René-Clair, an annual prize given to a distinguished filmmaker.
In 1967, he received another honorary doctorate from the Royal College of Art in London.
Besides many awards for his individual films, Clair also received an honorary prize at the 11th Moscow International Film Festival in 1979 for his overall contribution to cinema.
See also
In Spanish: René Clair para niños
