René Clair

The title of this article contains the character é. Where it is unavailable or not desired, the name may be represented as Rene Clair.

René Clair
René Clair and Eric Satie, 1924
Born	René-Lucien Chomette 11 November 1898(1898-11-11) Paris, France
Died	15 March 1981(1981-03-15) (aged 82) Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hauts-de-Seine, Île-de-France, France
Years active	1924 - 1965

René Clair (11 November 1898 – 15 March 1981) born René-Lucien Chomette, was a French filmmaker.

Biography

He was born in Paris and grew up in the Les Halles quarter. He attended the Lycée Montaigne and the Lycée Louis-le-Grand. During World War I, he served as an ambulance driver. After the war, he started a career as a journalist under the pseudonym René Desprès. He also made his debut as an actor and, after an introduction from his brother Henri Chomette, he became an assistant to Jacques de Baroncelli.

In 1924, he produced his first films, Entr'acte and Paris qui dort, which were followed by a quick succession of notable films. During World War II, he went to Hollywood and was stripped of his French citizenship by the Vichy government.

He was given an honorary doctorate by the University of Cambridge and received the Grand Prix du Cinéma Français in 1953. In 1960, he was elected to the Académie Française. He came to personify French film, and the prize for film awarded by the Académie Française bears his name.

Clair started making films before the advent of sound, and therefore had very conflicting views of its uses; he was forced to use sound in his films for financial success. However, in lieu of creating films from theater plays like other French directors, Clair used sound to take the audience out of the narrative and into a different reality.

Clair's films And Then There Were None and Le Silence est d'or both won best picture at the Locarno International Film Festival making him as of 2009 one of only two directors to do so.

One of his notable films, À nous la liberté led to a controversy involving Modern Times .

Filmography

Feature films

Le Fantôme du Moulin-Rouge (1925) The Phantom of the Moulin-Rouge Le Voyage imaginaire (1926) The Imaginary Voyage La Proie du vent (1927) The Prey of the Wind Un chapeau de paille d'Italie (1928) An Italian Straw Hat Les Deux timides (1928) Two Timid Souls Sous les toits de Paris (1930) Under the Roofs of Paris Le Million (1931) The Million À nous la liberté (1931) Freedom for Us Quatorze Juillet (1932) Bastille Day The Ghost Goes West (1935) Break the News (1938) The Flame of New Orleans (1941)

I Married a Witch (1942) Forever and a Day (1943) It Happened Tomorrow (1944) And Then There Were None (1945) Le Silence est d'or (1947) Silence Is Golden La Beauté du diable (1950) Beauty of the Devil Les Belles de nuit (1952) Beauties of the Night Les Grandes Manoeuvres (1955) The Grand Maneuver Summer Manoeuvres Porte des Lilas (1957) Gate of Lilacs The Gates of Paris Tout l'or du monde (1961) All the Gold in the World Les Fêtes galantes (1965) The Lace Wars

Short films

• Entr'acte (1924)
• Paris qui dort (1924)
  • Paris Asleep
  • The Crazy Ray
• 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

• Les Fables de La Fontaine (1964) (episodes "?")

Awards & recognitions

• À nous la liberté (1931)
  • Venice Film Festival Audience Referendum Winner - Most Amusing Film
• The Ghost Goes West (1935)
  • Venice Film Festival Official Selection
• Les Belles de nuit (1952)
  • Venice Film Festival FIPRESCI Prize Winner

Cultural offices
Preceded by Fernand Gregh	Académie Française Seat 19 1960 - 1981	Succeeded by Pierre Moinot

See also

• Cinema pur

External links

• René Clair at the Internet Movie Database
• Bibliography of books and articles about Rene Clair via UC Berkeley Media Resources center

Persondata
Name	Clair, Rene
Alternative names
Short description	Film director
Date of birth	11 November 1898
Place of birth	Paris, France
Date of death	15 March 1981
Place of death	Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hauts-de-Seine, Île-de-France, France