Bertrand Tavernier Films

Bertrand Tavernier was born on 25 April 1941 in Lyon, the home of the Lumière brothers and the birthplace of French cinema. His father, René Tavernier, was a poet who edited Confluences, one of the few free journals operating under Vichy. But while his respect for text came from his father, Tavernier's love of cinema began during his lycée days ... show more >

Bertrand Tavernier was born on 25 April 1941 in Lyon, the home of the Lumière brothers and the birthplace of French cinema. His father, René Tavernier, was a poet who edited Confluences, one of the few free journals operating under Vichy. But while his respect for text came from his father, Tavernier's love of cinema began during his lycée days in Paris, when he used to sneak off to screenings with classmate, Volker Schlondörff. Indeed, Tavernier was such a cinéaste that he kept a movie scrapbook, which stood him in good stead when he quit his legal studies at the Sorbonne to concentrate on reviewing films for the student newspaper, L'Étrave.

Tavernier was soon writing for such influential titles as Positif, Combat and Cahiers du Cinéma. But he always remained loyal to the classical Hollywood narrative approach and, even with the coming of the nouvelle vague, he was never as outspoken against what François Truffaut had dubbed 'the Tradition of Quality', which placed as much emphasis on the eloquence of the dialogue as the ingenuity of the visuals. In 1960, Tavernier was hired as an assistant on Léon Morin, Prêtre (1960) by director Jean-Pierre Melville, who also recommended him to producer Georges de Beauregard, who encouraged Tavernier to make his first short films, Baiser de Judas and Un Chance explosive, which were respectively included in the portmanteaux, Les Baisers (1963) and La Chance et l'amour (1964).

Disowning these neophyte efforts, Tavernier joined Pierre Rissient's press agency in 1965 and promoted films by US titans like John Ford, Howard Hawks, Raoul Walsh, John Huston, Samuel Fuller, Budd Boetticher and Sam Peckinpah, while learning his craft on set visits to such French auteurs as Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol, Alain Tanner, Agnès Varda and Claude Sautet. His continued association with the mainstream, however, led to him being dropped by Positif, but his reputation as a critic was reinforced by 30 Years of American Cinema, which he co-wrote with Jean-Pierre Coursodon, while his industry stock rose with the screenplays for Riccardo Freda's Coplan ouvre le feu à Mexico and Jean Leduc's Capitaine Singrid (both 1967).

Having failed to secure funding for his adaption of Robert Louis Stevenson's The Beach at Falesa, with Jacques Brel and James Mason, Tavernier made his feature debut with L'Horloger de St. Paul/The Watchmaker of St Paul (1974), an adaptation of a Georges Simenon novella, which he co-wrote with 'Tradition of Quality' scenarists Jean Aurenche and Pierre Bost. Focusing on the relationship between a detective (Jean Rochefort) and the father of a man suspected of murdering a factory informer (Philippe Noiret), the film's visual authenticity was enhanced by the intensity and intelligence of the dialogue, which he and Aurenche recaptured in Que la fête commence/Let Joy Reign Supreme (1975), which starred Noiret as Philippe d'Orléans, the 18th-century regent who sparked a Breton uprising as he allowed himself to be manipulated by Abbé Dubois (Rochefort), distracted by his goddaughter (Christine Pascal) and persuaded to acquiesce in the transportation of peasants to Louisiana.

Emerging as the Robert Altman of French cinema for his revisionist approach to established genres, Tavernier attempted another period piece with The Judge and the Assassin (1976), in which Noiret's 19th-century magistrate traps and interrogates child murderer, Michel Galabru. The idea that a single death was an affront to society, while thousands were allowed to die with impugnity in factories or war zones became a pet Tavernier theme, which he would revisit in La Mort en direct/Death Watch (1979), a futuristic treatise on the eradication of disease and demise that anticipated the vogue for reality TV; Coup de torchon/Clean Slate (1981), which saw 1930s colonial cop Philippe Noiret exact his revenge on those who had exploited his complacency; La Vie et rien d'autre/Life and Nothing But (1989), in which Noiret excelled as a Great War major supervising the claiming of corpses and their belongings in an attempt to cope with the savage and futile slaughter he had witnessed at the front; and Captaine Conan (1996), which won Tavernier the César for Best Director and centred on trench veteran Philippe Torreton, whose genius for killing made him a wartime hero, yet transforms him into a menace to society thereafter.

In between these studies of societal hypocrisy, Tavernier produced a series of more intimate chamber dramas that were remarkable for the quality of their lead performances. Michel Piccoli becomes involved with Christine Pascal's residents association while trying to write a screenplay in Des Enfants gatés/Spoiled Children (1977), while Nathalie Baye reassesses her commitment to teaching and her lover in the wake of a nervous breakdown in Une Semaine de vacances/A Week's Vacation (1980). In Un Dimanche à la campagne/A Sunday in the Country (1984), widowed painter Louis Ducreux attempts to reconcile his formal style with daughter Sabine Azèma's bohemianism, while saxophonist Dexter Gordon accepts the friendship of François Cluzet in a bid to conquer his demons in 'Round Midnight (1986). Finally, in La Passion Béatrice (1987), medieval maiden Julie Delpy endures the disappointment of discovering that long-captive father Bernard-Pierre Donnadieu is a brute, while Jane Birkin comes closer to detached, convalescing father Dirk Bogarde in Daddy Nostalgie/These Foolish Things (1990).

Besides D'Artagnan's Daughter (1994), which he completed after 84 year-old Riccardo Freda was fired, Tavernier spent the early 1990s surveying the contemporary scene. In the uncompromising police procedural, L.627 (1992), he followed drug cop Didier Bazace as he despairs of boss Jean-Paul Comart for refusing to bust the barons ruining the lives of victims like HIV+ hooker Lara Guirao, while in L'Appât/The Bait (1995), the focus fell on Marie Gillain, who acquiesces in boyfriend Olivier Sitruk's scheme to entrap middle-aged dupes. More impressive, however, was Ça commence aujourd'hui/It All Starts Today (1999), a dual winner at Berlin that starred Philippe Torreton as a teacher trying to make a difference in a rundown mining town.

Tavernier followed Laissez-passer/Safe Conduct (2002), his portrait of the French film industry under the Nazi Occupation, with Holy Lola (2004), which accompanied Jacques Gamblin and Isabelle Carré to Cambodia as they sought to adopt a baby. More recently, he returned Stateside for In the Electric Mist (2008), an adaptation of a James Lee Burke novel and then back to France for The Princess of Montpensier (2010), a gripping costume drama.

Tavernier has been dismissed in some quarters for being both the heir to the 'Tradition of Quality' and Jean Renoir's successor as the great humanist of French cinema. However, he has always adhered to the lessons the New Wavers learned from Hollywood's studio auteurs and, consequently, he has developed a style that is personal and accessible, as well as artistically and intellectually challenging.
< show less