MAN
IN THE SHADOWS:
THE FILMS OF ALAIN DELON
When Godard cast Alain Delon as completely opposite twin brothers in NOUVELLE VAGUE, he was definitely on to something essential about Delon, the actor. Throughout a career spanning almost 50 years and 75 films, Alain Delon has frequently seemed split in two, his daunting grace and disarming beauty barely masking a dark, raging internal world. Born in Sceaux in 1935, Delon dropped out of school early, working a variety of odd jobs before serving in the French army in Vietnam. After his return he decided to try his luck in the movies, landing, within a few years, a role as a hit man in Yves Allégret's QUAND LA FEMME S’EN MÉLE (1957). His big break came two years later, when René Clement cast him as Tom Ripley in his adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's THE TALENTED MR. RIPLEY. Over the next few years, Delon would make his mark working with directors such as Visconti (ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS, THE LEOPARD), Antonioni (THE ECLIPSE), Melville (LE SAMOURAÏ, DIRTY MONEY) and Losey (MR. KLEIN). As he grew older, and the youthful softness of his features began to harden, Delon became increasingly identified as an actor (and later as a producer, writer and director) with the policier, the crime film. With its penchant for emphasizing the treacherousness of appearances and plots that often hinge on betrayals or sudden revelations, the policier provided the perfect vehicle for Delon to continue to explore the duplicitous persona that has always been at the core of his appeal. —Richard Peña, Film Society of Lincoln Center.
This series was organized in collaboration with the Bureau du Cinéma
of the Ministère des Affaires Etrangères, Paris, Cultural
Services of the French Embassy, New York, and the Film Society of Lincoln
Center, New York. Special thanks to Cinecittà Holding, Studio Canal,
Pathé International, Vega Film, Marie Bonnel, Richard Peña,
Camilla Cormanni and Jacques-Eric Strauss. Film capsules from the Lincoln
Center program.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
SAT 7 P.M
GUILD THEATRE
THE LEOPARD
ITALY 1963
DIRECTOR: LUCHINO VISCONTI Italy in the 1860s. The country is being united thanks to the efforts of Garibaldi, but the rise of the new nation is about to eclipse an older way of life. The Prince of Salina (Burt Lancaster) knows that he's soon to be one of the first victims of these changing times, but then a possible way out emerges: his penniless nephew, Tancredi (Alain Delon), is to marry Angelica (Claudia Cardinale), the beautiful daughter of the wealthy merchant Don Calogaro Sedara (Paolo Stoppa). An entrée into this ascendant business class might provide Salina with the means to keep up his lifestyle and even marry off his daughters. Although THE LEOPARD is finally Lancaster's show —and what a show it is!—playing second fiddle in this company would be an honor for any actor. Visconti emphasizes Delon’s vulnerability, as his character betrays himself and his own emotions for some questionable greater good.
(205 mins.)
OCT 5 SUN
7 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
ANY NUMBER CAN WIN
FRANCE 1963
DIRECTOR: HENRY VERNEUIL IFresh out of jail, Charles (Jean Gabin) recruits
a young copain, Francis (Alain Delon), he met inside to help him plan
and execute one final, signature heist: the robbing of a luxurious casino
in Cannes. Their preparations are meticulous, all seems to be working
like clockwork, when things threaten to unravel. A beautifully told, jazzy
caper film that makes wonderful use of its French Riviera settings, ANY
NUMBER CAN WIN offers the special pleasure of watching the extraordinary
interplay between Gabin and Delon, the old lion of French cinema jousting
with the up-and-coming star. The razor-sharp dialogue is by the master
scenarist of French crime movies, Michel Audiard. "A first-rate crime
film, comparable to the very best examples of the genre France has ever
produced."—Louis Chauvet, LE FIGARO. (117 mins.)
OCT
11 SAT 7 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
THE ECLIPSE
ITALY/FRANCE 1962
DIRECTOR: MICHELANGELO ANTONIONI Alain Delon was perhaps never more beautiful
than he was as Piero, the cold yet seductive stock broker in Antonioni's
THE ECLIPSE. The film begins as Vittoria (Monica Vitti) breaks up with
her long-time lover and heads out to seek new adventures. Joining her
mother at the Roman stock exchange, she catches the eye of the dynamic
Piero; during a moment of silence in memory of a dead trader—one
of the most remarkable scenes in Antonioni's cinema. The two form a bond
that will veer between irrepressible passion and feigned indifference.
While Vitti, Antonioni's principal muse in this period, is surely the
film's heart, Delon is just as undoubtedly ECLIPSE's soul, the symbol
of a modern, sophisticated, yet ultimately empty Italian society. of the
genre France has ever produced."—Louis Chauvet, LE FIGARO.
(125 mins.)
OCT 17 FRI 7 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
PURPLE NOON
FRANCE 1960
DIRECTOR: RENE CLEMENT Alain Delon became an international star with his
role as Tom Ripley in René Clement's effective screen rendition
of the wonderfully sordid world of expatriate American author Patricia
Highsmith. Sent by the wealthy Mr. Greenleaf to track down his playboy
son Philip (Maurice Ronet) in Europe and bring him home, Ripley finds
Philip living large on the Riviera. At first Philip seems willing to cooperate
with Tom, but actually he's just stringing him along; continually feeling
humiliated, and threatened with having his funding cut off by Mr. Greenleaf,
Ripley grows increasingly desperate, revealing finally a new and terrifying
side to his personality. Just as the warm sun and soft pastel shades of
the Mediterranean mask the harshness and decadence of these characters,
so too the grace and beauty of the 24-year-old Delon are a perfect counterpoint
to the darkness that is Tom Ripley.
(118 mins.)
OCT 18 SAT 7 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
MR. KLEIN
FRANCE 1976
DIRECTOR: JOSEPH LOSEY Delon gives one of his finest performances in this
searing indictment of emotional and political indifference in wartime
France. One morning in 1942, art dealer Robert Klein (Delon) awakens to
find on his doorstep a Jewish newspaper, with a subscription label addressed
to him. Klein is puzzled—he's a Catholic Alsatian, and although
he himself has nothing against Jews, being mistaken for Jewish in German-occupied
Paris is at least inconvenient. So he decides to track down the source
of the confusion, and soon is convinced that another, Jewish Robert Klein,
is trying to take over his identity; he even appeals to the police, who
think he's simply a Jew trying an elaborate camouflage with such a preposterous
ruse. Klein's search descends into a Kafkaesque nightmare, brilliantly
and coolly calibrated by Losey as all fixed points of reference gradually
fade away. With a wonderful cameo by Jeanne Moreau. (123 mins.)
OCT
19 SUN 7 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
THE SAMOURAÏ
FRANCE 1967
DIRECTOR: JEAN-PIERRE MELVILLE For many Melville's most perfect film,
THE SAMOURAÏ is the story of Jeff Costello (Delon), a cool-eyed contract
killer known for his extraordinary attention to detail. One night, while
doing a job in a nightclub, he meets the beautiful lounge pianist Cathy,
and suddenly Costello starts slipping up. Melville's Japanese reference
in his film's title is twofold: on the one hand, the character of Jeff
Costello is a kind of modern warrior, a killer bound by a strict code
of ethics. On the other, THE SAMOURAÏ is as ritualized as a classic
kabuki drama, with each genre convention of the crime thriller foregrounded
and emphasized. Yet THE SAMOURAÏ never feels cold or merely formal;
underneath this seemingly well-ordered world run deep passions.
(95 mins.)
OCT 24 FRIDAY 7
P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
NOUVELLE VAGUE
FRANCE/SWITZERLAND 1990
DIRECTOR: JEAN-LUC GODARD For his epic encounter with Jean-Luc Godard,
Delon was asked to play two roles: a lost soul run down by a beautiful
young woman who takes him to her lakeside mansion to recover—and
the man's twin brother, who just happens to be his opposite in every way.
Cogently described by VILLAGE VOICE critic J. Hoberman as "an environment
as much as it is a narrative," NOUVELLE VAGUE assembles a screenplay
made up almost entirely of quotations from cinematic, literary and philosophical
works to create an elaborate and ultimately deeply moving defense against
despair. Godard actually released the entire soundtrack separately as
a CD. Even critics of this controversial film describe the film as ravishingly
beautiful, and Godard seems to ask how such a wondrous world could at
the same time contain so much mental and emotional suffering. Much of
the film was shot near the childhood summer home of Godard, marking NOUVELLE
VAGUE as perhaps a kind of return to his roots. (90 mins.)
OCT 25 26 SAT 7
P.M., SUN 4:30 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS
FRANCE 1960
DIRECTOR: LUCHINO VISCONTI "Rocco is about the awful inevitability
of the fate (as Visconti sees it) of Rosaria Parondi (Katina Paxinou)
and her five sons when they emigrate to Milan to find a better life. Vincenzo
(Spiros Focas), the eldest, muddles through without too much damage. Simone
(Renato Salvatori) becomes, briefly, a promising prize fighter, only to
wind up as a petty crook and murderer. It is Rocco (Alain Delon), the
middle son, who is both the hope of the family and its undoing. As written,
and as played by Mr. Delon, Rocco is one of the most vivid and complex
characters in all of Visconti's work. His misguided saintliness, which
recalls Dostoevsky's The Idiot, is as responsible for the family tragedy
as the system that ignores the Parondis. At this vantage point, Rocco
looks better than ever."—Vincent Canby, THE NEW YORK TIMES.
(180 mins.)
OCT
30 THU 7 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
DIRTY MONEY
FRANCE 1972
DIRECTOR: JEAN-PIERRE MELVILLE Delon plays police commissioner Edouard
Coleman, whose efforts to smash a drug-running syndicate have thus far
come up short. A chance tip leads him to focus his investigation on a
quiet seaside town. There, he meets Cathy (Catherine Deneuve), who for
a while gets his mind off the case—until he discovers that she's
the mistress of the very man he's after. Melville truly pulled out all
the stops for a remarkable sequence involving a transfer of a load of
heroin from a moving train to helicopter, yet what resonates most in DIRTY
MONEY is the thick atmosphere of disappointment, as each character comes
to grips with how much less life turned out to offer than they had originally
dreamed. (105 mins.)
NOV
1 SAT 7 P.M.
WHITSELL AUDITORIUM
THE WIDOW COUDERC
FRANCE 1971
DIRECTOR: PIERRE GRANIER-DEFERRE Just as in ANY NUMBER CAN WIN Delon got
to go mano a mano with the great Jean Gabin, in THE WIDOW COUDERC Delon
gets to take on another legend of the French cinema: Simone Signoret.
She plays a woman who, after years of suffering brutal treatment at the
hands of her husband and father-in-law, finds herself a contented widow
running her own farm. One day, while trying to carry a new machine to
the farm house, she's given a hand by a handsome stranger, Jean Lavigne
(Delon). She offers him a job and a place to stay—but will the farm
prove big enough for both of them? (90 mins.)