A retrospective of films starring Jeanne Moreau forms part of the Edinburgh International Film Festiaval 2008.
Known for her cool intelligence and offbeat demeanour, at once sensuous and austere, Jeanne Moreau was France’s leading stage actress before appearing in some of the finest films of the 50’s and 60’s.
Throughout the ensuing decades and up to the present day, she has continued to collaborate with the world’s leading filmmakers. She came to prominence in Louis Malle's "Lift to the Scaffold" (1957) and “Les Amants” (1958); but it was her unforgettable performance as the free-spirited Catherine in François Truffaut's "Jules et Jim" (1961) - see trailer below - that made her an international star.
She continued to distinguish herself in the films of such legendary directors as Michelangelo Antonioni, Orson Welles, Luis Buñuel, Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Joseph Losey.
Later collaborators include Bertrand Blier, André Téchiné, Theodrous Angelopoulos, François Ozon and Amos Gitaï.
Moreau’s personification of French womanhood and sensuality is actually the product of a French father and a British mother and she was registered as a resident alien during the World War II occupation.
But Moreau's heart was in France, and when her parents divorced and her mother returned to England, she remained with her father. Yet, her fluency in her mother's native language would help Moreau gain international stardom.
A graduate of the Paris Conservatory of Dramatic Arts, Moreau made both her stage and screen debuts in 1948. While she had many stage successes with the famed Comedie-Francaise (she was one of the company's youngest members ever) and played a renowned Maggie in the French stage version of "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" (1956), Moreau was almost 30 before her film career took off thanks to her work with Malle.
At the time of the release of "Les Amants/The Lovers", her earthy, intelligent and subtle portrayal of an adulteress caused a scandal in France. While "La Notte" (1961) and "Jules et Jim" made Moreau an international star, she made further impressions in two films directed by Orson Welles, "The Trial" (1962) and "Chimes at Midnight/Falstaff" (1966).
Moreau could portray ordinariness or a sublime beauty. When the role engaged her personality (as in her "Great Catherine" 1968), she was superb. As she aged, Moreau continued to entrance. Past 60, she was as sensuous as ever playing a flamboyant family friend who saves a young girl from a potential marriage mistake by having sex with the groom before the wedding in "The Summer House" (1993).
Other recent roles include the elegant French expatriate celebrity who returns to Paris in "The Proprietor" (1996), and, for TV, "A Foreign Field" (PBS, 1994), a film about a reunion of D-Day veterans in which Moreau was the now older woman who shared her charms with many a G.I. back in 1994.
As director/screenwriter, Moreau was applauded for "Lumiere" (1975), the story of several generations of actresses. She also helmed "L'Adolescente" (1978), a semi-autobiographical tale of a girl sent to live with her grandmother in 1939, and a documentary homage to silent screen heroine "Lillian Gish" (1984).