Jean Renoir

Born: 15 September, 1894 Died: 12 February, 1979 Country of Birth: France The saving grace of the cinema is that with patience and a little love we may arrive at that wonderfully complex creature which is called man.

Jean Renoir was born in Montmartre, Paris, the second son of the famed Impressionist Pierre-Auguste. Following a move south to Cagnes-sur-Mer to aid his father’s rheumatism, Jean, his brothers and others in the family coterie routinely became subjects for Pierre-Auguste’s paintings.

A cavalryman during the Great War, Renoir suffered a leg injury and during his convalescence discovered the cinema, particularly via Charlie Chaplin and Erich von Stroheim. After his father’s death, Jean ventured into film production himself—financed by the sale of his father’s paintings—and in 1924, directed his first film, Une Vie Sans Joie.

The 1930s proved to be Renoir’s most successful and productive period, his unflinching humanism combining perhaps with his father’s formal eye to establish a varied oeuvre, from the comedy Bondu Saved From Drowning (1932) to the politically-tinged Le Crime de Monsiuer Lange (1936) and the international anti-war success, La Grande Illusion (1937), nominated for a Best Picture Oscar®.

Derided by audiences upon its release in 1939, La Régle de Jeu (The Rules of the Game)—a biting class satire set during a rural shooting party—was an unmitigated commercial disaster for Renoir. Banned, then re-edited, it flopped a second time, and the extant prints were destroyed in wartime bombings. Reconstructed from fragments under Renoir’s supervision in the 1950s, The Rules of the Game is now considered among the best films ever made.

Having fled France in 1940, Renoir’s Hollywood career was unremarkable, his subtlety lost on the Americans. Despite being naturalized and receiving an Oscar® nomination for The Southerner (1945), he shot his first colour film, The River, in India, financed by a Hollywood florist, which went on to win the International Prize at Venice in 1951. Returning to France, Renoir made a trio of musical satires in colour: The Golden Coach (1953), French Cancan (1954) and Elena and Her Men (1956). All the while interest in his pre-war films from the Cahiers du Cinéma critics began the steady resuscitation of his reputation.

Never one to be pigeonholed stylistically or thematically—but steadfastly in favour of independent production—Renoir made his last film in 1969, Le Petite Théâtre de Jean Renoir, a tribute to the student demonstrations of May 1968. He spent his final years in Beverley Hills, writing novels and memoirs and nursing ill health, until his death in 1979.

Available to Own

La Bête Humaine

The River

The Golden Coach

Filmography

1970 LE PETITE THÉATRE DE JEAN RENOIR /THE LITTLE THEATRE OF JEAN RENOIR

1962 LE CAPORAL ÉPLINGÉ / THE ELUSIVE CORPORAL

1959 LE DÉJEUNER SUR L’HERBE

1959 LE TESTAMENT DU DOCTEUR CORDELIER (television)

1956 ELENA ET LES HOMMES/ELENA AND HER MEN

1954 FRENCH CANCAN

1953 LE CARROSSE D’OR/THE GOLDEN COACH

1951 THE RIVER

1947 THE WOMAN ON THE BEACH

1946 THE DIARY OF A CHAMBERMAID

1945 THE SOUTHERNER

1944 SALUTE TO FRANCE

1943 THIS LAND IS MINE

1943 THE AMAZING MRS HOLIDAY (uncredited)

1941 SWAMP WATER

1939 LA REGLE DE JEU/THE RULES OF THE GAME

1938 LA BETE HUMAINE/THE HUMAN BEAST

1938 LA MARSEILLAISE

1937 LA GRANDE ILLUSION

1936 LES BAS-FONDS

1936 LA VIE EST A NOUS/THE PEOPLE OF FRANCE

1936 LE CRIME DE MONSIEUR LANGE

1936 PARTIE DE CAMPAGNE

1935 TONI

1933 MADAME BOVARY

1932 BONDU SAVED FROM DROWNING

1932 LA NUIT DU CARREFOUR

1932 CHOTARD ET CIE

1931 LA CHIENNE

1931 ON PURGE BÉBÉ

1928 LE TOURNOI DANS LA CITÉ/TOURNAMENT IN THE CITY

1928 TIRE AU FLANC/THE SAD SACK

1928 LA PETITE MARCHANDE D’ALLUMETTES

1927 MARQUITTA

1927 SUR UN AIR DE CHARLESTON

1926 NANA

1925 LA FILLE DE L’EAU/WHIRLPOOL OF FATE

1924 UNE VIE SANS JOIE