Chabrol, Claude

born June 24, 1930, Paris, France

French film director, screenwriter, and producer.

After working in public relations in 20th Century-Fox's Paris office, he directed The Cousins (1959), one of the first films of the New Wave movement. Among his many other films are Les Biches (1968), Violette (1978), The Story of Women (1988), and Merci pour la chocolat (2000). He admired Alfred Hitchcock and used a style similar to his in several mystery thrillers, including This Man Must Die (1969), Le Boucher (1970), and La Cérémonie (1995).

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▪ French director

born June 24, 1930, Paris, France

 

 motion-picture director, scenarist, and producer who was France's master of the mystery thriller.

      After attending the School of Political Science at the University of Paris, he was a critic and public relations man for Twentieth Century-Fox's French office. Le Beau Serge (1958; “Handsome Serge”; Bitter Reunion), written and produced by Chabrol, was an important film of the New Wave (Nouvelle Vague), a term applied in the late 1950s to a widely diversified experimental movement in French films. That same year he wrote, directed, and produced Les Cousins (1958; The Cousins) and later directed such pictures as Les Bonnes Femmes (1960; “The Good Women”), Landru (1962; Bluebeard), Les Biches (1968; The Does), and Le Boucher (1969; The Butcher).

      As the New Wave receded, Chabrol maintained a prodigious output, creating such works as Violette Nozière (1978; Violette), Le Cheval d'orgueil (1979; The Horse of Pride), Blood Relatives (1981), Poulet au vinaigre (1985; “Chicken in Vinegar”), Une Affaire de femmes (1988; Story of Women), and an adaptation (1991) of Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary. His critical successes at the turn of the century include La Cérémonie (1995; A Judgement in Stone), Merci pour le chocolat (2000; Nightcap), and La Fleur de mal (2003; The Flower of Evil).

      Chabrol's fascination with the grotesque, his use of the irony of situation, and his commingling of tragedy and comedy reflect the strong stylistic influence of the English director Alfred Hitchcock (Hitchcock, Sir Alfred). He was coauthor of a biography of Hitchcock in 1957.

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