The Last Metro ( French : Le Dernier Métro ) is a 1980 period drama film , co-written and directed by François Truffaut , that stars Catherine Deneuve and Gérard Depardieu .
150-581: Set in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1942, the film follows the fortunes of a small theatre in the Montmartre quarter which keeps up passive resistance by maintaining its cultural integrity, despite censorship , antisemitism and material shortages. The title evokes two salient facts of city life under the Germans: fuel shortages led people to spend their evenings in theatres and other places of entertainment, but
300-802: A German naval officer, Alfons Moser, in the back, as he was boarding the metro at the Barbés-Rochecouart station . The Germans had routinely taken hostages among the French civilian population to deter attacks. They responded to the Barbés-Rochechouart metro attack by executing three hostages in Paris, and another twenty the following month. Hitler was furious at the leniency of the German commander, and demanded that in case of future assassinations, there must be one hundred hostages executed for every German killed. After
450-452: A Resistance network that smuggled Jews from France to Argentina. He collected a large advance from his clients and then instructed them to come to his house, bringing their gold, silver and other valuables with them. After they arrived, he brought them to his consulting room, and, convincing them vaccination was required in order to enter Argentina, gave them a lethal intravenous injection, then watched their slow death in an adjacent room through
600-569: A brawl. A German soldier was punched. Bonsergent's friends escaped, but he was arrested and refused to give the names of his friends to the Germans. He was held in jail for nineteen days, taken to court, charged with "an act of violence against a member of the German Army", and sentenced to death. Bonsergent was executed by firing squad on 23 December, the first civilian in France executed for resistance against
750-406: A film about death would be difficult to market or attract an audience, but felt strongly that 'this kind of theme can touch a deep chord in many people. Everyone has their dead.' He hoped that the film would connect with the audience, and stated that he wanted people to watch it with their jaws dropped, moving from one astonishing moment to the next. Truffaut took a personal interest in promoting
900-487: A film, then it is not a film." Almendros later said that, despite the film's somber tone, "this film was put together with joy, and the shooting was the most pleasant" of his career. Many of the scenes were shot in the four-story Maison Troublet in Honfleur. This house and its grounds included sets for many of the film's main locations: Davenne's house, his office at The Globe and the auction room. Other locations included
1050-524: A firing squad. As a consequence of the demonstration, the Sorbonne University was closed, students were required to regularly report to the police, and the Latin Quarter was closely watched. Another incident took place on 10 November; a 28-year-old French engineer named Jacques Bonsergent and his friends, coming home from a wedding, ran into a group of German soldiers in the blackout and got into
1200-509: A first draft called La Fiancée disparue ( The Vanished Fiancée ). Truffaut thought the script was too long and Gruault made cuts. Truffaut's continuing requests for script modifications caused Gruault to become dissatisfied working with him. Truffaut, also busy writing the script for Alain Resnais 's Mon oncle d'Amérique , put the entire project on hold and eventually shot Small Change and The Man Who Loved Women . He continued to research
1350-463: A floral Cross of Lorraine , the symbol of de Gaulle's Free France. They were chased away by the police. At nightfall, the event became more provocative; some three thousand students gathered, chanting "Vive La France" and "Vive l'Angleterre", and invading Le Tyrol , a bar popular with the Jeune Front , a fascist youth group, and scuffling with police. At 6:00 pm, German soldiers arrived, surrounded
1500-462: A good pork chop, hidden under cabbage and served without the necessary tickets, along with a liter of Beaujolais and a real coffee; sometimes it was on the first floor at rue Dauphine, where you could listen to the BBC while sitting next to Picasso." The restrictions and shortage of goods led to the existence of a thriving black market . Producers and distributors of food and other scarce products set aside
1650-445: A lesbian. Bernard is then introduced to Marion, the owner of the theatre and its leading lady. Marion's Jewish husband, Lucas, serves as the theater's director, believed to have fled Paris; however, he is clandestinely hiding in the theater's cellar. Marion secretly releases him each evening, providing meals and materials for future productions. Their evenings are spent in the empty theater, where they engage in passionate discussions about
SECTION 10
#17330941502471800-535: A machine for serving Germany. Shipments to Germany had first priority; what was left went to Paris and the rest of France. All of the trucks manufactured at the Citroen factory went directly to Germany. (Later many of these trucks were cleverly sabotaged by the French workers, who recalibrated the dip sticks so that the trucks would run out of oil without warning). Most shipments of meat, wheat, milk produce and other agricultural products also went to Germany. What remained for
1950-648: A new French version of the short story was published, renewing his interest. Truffaut commented on the film, "the story was difficult to construct, but at the same time, I was attracted to the subject." In July of that year he then reached a contract agreement with screenwriter Jean Gruault to begin drafting a film adaptation. Truffaut and Gruault had previously collaborated on Jules and Jim (1962), The Wild Child (1970), and Two English Girls (1971). For several years Truffaut had become increasingly interested in people from his life who had died, beginning with his mentor and father-figure André Bazin , who had died
2100-702: A new organization, the Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce ( Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg ) was created to catalog and store the art. It was moved to the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume , a building in the Tuileries Gardens used by the Louvre for temporary exhibits. More than four hundred crates of art works were brought to the Jeu de Paume by Luftwaffe personnel, unpacked and cataloged. Hermann Göring ,
2250-472: A portion of their goods for the black market, and used middle-men to sell them to customers. The bars of the Champs-Élysées, and other parts of Paris, became common meeting places between the middle-men and clients. Parisians bought cigarettes, meat, coffee, wine and other products which frequently neither the middle-man nor the customer had ever seen. Due to the shortage of fuel, the number of automobiles on
2400-503: A rhythm and establish a religious, ritualistic atmosphere for the cast and crew. As Truffaut has stated, both camera and actors movements follow Jaubert's music rhythm. Filmmaker François Porcile later said "It's not surprising to find, in the sudden explosive tension and somber conviction of his acting, a direct echo of Jaubert's style, with its gathering momentum and sudden restraint, its reticence and violence." Truffaut explained: "I realized that his music, full of clarity and sunlight,
2550-523: A serious intestinal obstruction. The film shoot lasted fifty-nine days and ended on 21 April 1980. A recurring theme in Truffaut’s films has been linking film-making and film-watching. The Last Metro is self-conscious in this respect. In the opening the film mixes documentary footage with period re-creations alongside shots of contemporary film posters. Truffaut commented: “this film is not concerned merely with anti-semitism but intolerance in general” and
2700-417: A small Parisian magazine. The presence of Paul Massigny was also vital for the development of the story. Indeed, Truffaut stated that without Massigny there would be no film because it would be too static, and that The Green Room is a tale in which Massigny is the anti-hero. Gruault finished a new version of the script by February 1977. Truffaut worked on it with his assistant Suzanne Schiffman and completed
2850-460: A special connection to the theme of honouring and remembering the dead. In the film, he included portraits of people from his own life at the main character's "Altar of the Dead". The Green Room was one of Truffaut's most praised films, and also one of his least successful financially. The action takes place ten years after the end of World War I in a small town in France. The protagonist, Julien Davenne,
3000-611: A spyhole in the door. Afterwards, he cut up their bodies, put the pieces in the well, and dissolved them with quicklime. His activities attracted the attention of the Gestapo, which arrested him in 1943, thus allowing him to claim later that he had been a real member of the Resistance. His crimes were discovered after the Liberation in 1944, and he was charged with the murders of twenty-seven persons, tried in 1946, and sentenced to death. He went to
3150-635: A suite of variations on a single theme." Truffaut completed the editing of The Green Room in March 1978 and showed it to his trusted friends and co-workers, who immediately praised the film and called it one of his best. Many wrote to him via letter, such as Isabelle Adjani , who stated: 'Of all your films it is the one that most moved me and spoke to me, along with Two English Girls . I felt good crying in your presence.' Alain Delon told Truffaut: " The Green Room , along with Clément , Visconti and very few others,
SECTION 20
#17330941502473300-455: A tank on the roof, or coal gas or methane, extracted from the Paris sewers. The metro ran, but service was frequently interrupted and the cars were overcrowded. Three thousand five hundred buses had run on the Paris streets in 1939, but only five hundred were still running in the autumn of 1940. Bicycle-taxis became popular, and their drivers charged a high tariff. Bicycles became the means of transport for many Parisians, and their price soared;
3450-849: A tolerance is shown through the characters of Jean Poiret playing a homosexual director and Andrea Ferreol playing a lesbian designer. As in Truffaut's earlier films Jules et Jim and Two English Girls , there is a love triangle between the three principal characters: Marion Steiner (Deneuve), her husband Lucas (Heinz Bennent) and Bernard Granger (Depardieu), an actor in the theatre's latest production. The film recorded admissions in France of 3,384,045. The Last Metro has an approval rating of 88% on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes , based on 24 reviews, and an average rating of 7.4/10. Nazi-occupied Paris The city of Paris started mobilizing for war in September 1939, when Nazi Germany and
3600-507: A tour to Berlin, in exchange for the liberation of her husband, Porfirio Rubirosa , a Dominican diplomat suspected of espionage. The actress Arletty , the star of Les Enfants du Paradis and Hôtel du Nord , had a relationship with Hans Jürgen Soehring, a Luftwaffe officer, and gave the famous riposte to a member of the FFI interrogating her after the Liberation: "My heart is French, but my a--
3750-509: A used bicycle cost a month's salary. Transportation problems did not end with the liberation of Paris; the shortage of gasoline and lack of transport continued until well after the war. One of the greatest art thefts in history took place in Paris during the Occupation, as the Nazis looted the art of Jewish collectors on a grand scale. Great masterpieces in the Louvre had already been evacuated to
3900-441: A very difficult existence due to shortages of personnel, film and food, but it produced several genuine masterpieces, among which: Marcel Carné 's Les Enfants du Paradis ("Children of Paradise") which was filmed during the Occupation but not released until 1945. From the very beginning of the Occupation, Jews in Paris were treated with particular harshness. On October 18th, 1940, the German occupation authorities decreed, in what
4050-500: A villa in Royan , north of Bordeaux. He returned to Paris and resumed working in his studio on rue des Grands Augustins . He frequently received visitors at his studio, including Germans, some admiring and some suspicious. He had postcards made of his famous anti-fascist work, Guernica , to hand out as souvenirs to visitors, and had serious discussions of art and politics with visiting Germans, including writer Ernst Jünger . While his work
4200-413: A widower that Davenne comforts in the film and Patrick Maléon as the deaf-mute child. Truffaut also cast technicians and personnel from his production company in small roles. When asked about the message of The Green Room , Truffaut said "I am for the woman and against the man. As this century approaches its end, people are becoming more stupid and suicidal, and we must fight against this. The Green Room
4350-439: Is a war veteran who works as an editor at the newspaper, The Globe . He specializes in funeral announcements ("a virtuoso of the obituary", as defined by its editor-in-chief) and the thought of death haunts him. Davenne has reserved a room for the worship of his wife, Julie, on the upper floor of the house he shares with his elderly housekeeper, Mrs. Rambaud, and Georges, a deaf-mute boy. His wife had died eleven years previously, at
4500-454: Is also based on two other works by James: the 1903 novella The Beast in the Jungle and the 1896 short story " The Way It Came ". It was Truffaut's seventeenth feature film as a director and the third and last of his own films in which he acted in a leading role. It stars Truffaut, Nathalie Baye , Jean Dasté and Patrick Maléon. Truffaut spent several years working on the film's script and felt
4650-469: Is international." ' Jewish actors were not allowed to perform. Some places in Paris were frequented by homosexual actors and artists; notably the swimming pool in the Bois de Boulogne . The actor Jean Marais was officially harassed for his homosexuality, and the actor Robert-Hugues Lambert was arrested and deported, most likely because of his relationship with a German officer whom he did not want to name. He
The Last Metro - Misplaced Pages Continue
4800-576: Is known as the Ordonnance d'Aryanisation , that Jews would have a special status and be barred from liberal professions, such as commerce, industry, thus affecting lawyers, doctors, professors, shop owners, and also be barred from certain restaurants and public places, and that their property was seized. On May 23rd, 1942, the head of the Anti-Jewish section of the Gestapo , Adolf Eichmann , gave secret orders for
4950-479: Is not a fable, not a psychological picture. The moral is: One must deal with the living! This man has neglected life. Here we have a breakdown of the idea of survival." The Green Room was shot in the fall of 1977 in Honfleur , France with a budget of 3 million francs provided by United Artists . That summer, Truffaut scouted locations and hired his longtime collaborator, Néstor Almendros , as cinematographer. To give
5100-423: Is not the worshipping of death, but an extension of the love for the people that we have met and who are no longer alive, and the idea that they have a permanency. What matters is that Davenne refuses to forget, and this refusal is important for Truffaut. Truffaut recommended that Gruault read James's 1903 novella The Beast in the Jungle and 1896 short story " The Way It Came ", which were also incorporated into
5250-545: Is part of my secret garden." Éric Rohmer said to him: 'I found your film deeply moving. I found you deeply moving in your film.' Antoine Vitez told Truffaut: 'I haven't yet told you the emotion I felt on seeing The Green Room . What I see in it, deep down, is kindness, and that's what touches me most. Thank you for having included me in it.' Publicly, The Green Room was Truffaut's biggest financial failure, but one of his most critically praised films. One major French film critic, François Chalais of Le Figaro , disliked
5400-459: Is transformed into a forest of lighted candles, with photos of all the people he treasured in life. To keep the chapel, Davenne calls a young woman, Cécilia, secretary of the auction house that has regained a ring that had belonged to Julie. The friendship between the two seems to evolve when Paul Massigny, a French politician and Davenne's former best friend, dies. The film suggests that Massigny once betrayed Davenne but does not say what constituted
5550-575: The Academy Awards and the Golden Globes . On his way to begin rehearsals at the Théâtre Montmartre, where he has secured the male lead role for an upcoming production, young Bernard Granger finds himself repeatedly rebuffed by a woman he attempts to flirt with on the street. Upon arriving at the theater, he discovers that the woman is actually the production designer, Arlette, who happens to be
5700-619: The Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6 1944, the French Resistance in Paris launched an uprising on 19 August, seizing the police headquarters and other government buildings. The city was liberated by French and American troops on August 25th; the next day, General de Gaulle led a triumphant parade down the Champs-Élysées on August 26th, and organized a new government. In the following months, ten thousand Parisians who had collaborated with
5850-483: The Auschwitz extermination camp . The roundup was considered a failure by the Germans, since they had prepared trains for 32,000 persons. Arrests continued in 1943 and 1944. By the time of the Liberation, it was estimated that 43,000 Jews from the Paris region, or about half the total population of the community, had been sent to the concentration camps, and that 34,000 were murdered there. Many Parisians collaborated with
6000-717: The English Channel . On May 28th, the British realized the battle was lost and began withdrawing their soldiers from the beaches of Dunkerque . Paris was soon flooded with refugees from the battle zone. On June 3rd, the Germans bombed Paris and its suburbs for the first time, targeting in particular the Citroën automobile factory. 254 persons were killed, including 195 civilians. French Prime Minister Paul Reynaud dismissed his supreme military commander, Maurice Gamelin , and replaced him with
6150-676: The French Communist Party was more complicated; the Party had long denounced Nazism and Fascism, but after the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact on August 23rd 1939, had to reverse direction. The editors of the Communist Party newspaper, L'Humanité , which had been closed down by the French government, asked the Germans for permission to resume publishing, and it was granted. The Party also asked that workers resume work in
The Last Metro - Misplaced Pages Continue
6300-621: The French underworld , operated from 93, rue Lauriston . Many of its member were captured at the end of the war and executed. The Nazi security agencies also established Special Brigades under the Prefecture of Police in Paris, these units operated in accordance with the RHSA and the SS capturing resistance fighters and Allied agents, as well as rounding up Jews for deportation . Prisoners were routinely tortured by
6450-812: The Hôtel Lutetia ; the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) occupied the Ritz ; the Kriegsmarine (German Navy), the Hôtel de la Marine on the Place de la Concorde ; the Carlingue , the French auxiliary organization of the Gestapo , occupied the building at 93 rue Lauriston ; and the German commandant of Paris and his staff moved into the Hôtel Meurice on the rue de Rivoli . Paris became
6600-486: The Jeu de Paume , and filling the whole ground floor. The staff at the Jeu de Paume cataloged 218 major collections. Between April 1941 and July 1944, 4,174 cases of art works filling 138 boxcars, were shipped from Paris to Germany. Much of the art, but not all, was recovered after the war. While some painters left Paris, many remained and continued working. Georges Braque returned to Paris in autumn 1940 and quietly continued working. Pablo Picasso spent most of 1939 in
6750-571: The Pariser Zeitung (1941–1944), was also published for the soldiers. The German officers enjoyed the Ritz , Maxim's , the Coupole and other exclusive restaurants, as the exchange rate was fixed to favor the German occupiers. Many houses of prostitution existed in Paris and they began to cater to German clients. The headquarters of the Sicherheitsdienst , the counter-intelligence branch of
6900-570: The SS was at 84 Avenue Foch . French auxiliaries, who worked for the Gestapo , Sicherheitsdienst and Geheime Feldpolizei were based at 93, rue Lauriston in the 16th arrondissement of Paris . They were known as the Carlingue (or French Gestapo) and were active between 1941 and 1944. The group was founded by Pierre Bonny , a corrupt ex-policeman. It was subsequently led by Henri Lafont and Pierre Loutrel , two professional criminals who had been active in
7050-595: The Schorfheide Forest in Germany. Another Rothschild-owned painting, The Astronomer by Vermeer , was reserved for Hitler himself. Fifteen railroad boxcars full of artworks were sent to Germany with Göring's personal train. Göring visited the Jeu de Paume twelve more times in 1941, and five times in 1942, adding to his collection. Confiscations continued at banks, warehouses and private residences, with paintings, furniture, statues, clocks and jewelry accumulating at
7200-640: The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier beneath the Arc de Triomphe . The event was also announced on the 10th on the BBC. The day began quietly, as some 20,000 students laid wreaths and bouquets at the tomb and at the statue of Georges Clemenceau , on Place Clemenceau , by the Champs Élysées . This part of the day was tolerated by the French and German authorities. At midday, the demonstration became more provocative; some students carried
7350-465: The battle of Sedan (May 12th– May 15th 1940). Once the Occupation had begun, they started to return. By July 7th, the city government estimated the population had risen again to 1.5 million; it climbed to two million by October 22nd, and 2.5 million by January 1st 1941. At the beginning of 1943, it fell again, because of air raids by the Allies, the arrest and deportation of Jews and foreigners, and
7500-590: The châteaux of the Loire Valley and other designated locations. The architectural landmarks of the city were protected by sandbags. The French Army waited in the fortifications of the Maginot Line , while in Paris ration cards for gasoline were issued, restrictions were put on the sale of meat and, in February 1940, ration cards for food were issued; however, cafés and theatres remained open. The French defense plan
7650-528: The "struggle against the transience of life". Despite his strong feeling for the character, Truffaut was hesitant about the role and thought he may be perceived as too old. He had a wig made, but ended up not using it. . It was Truffaut's third and last of his own film in which he played a leading role. According to co-star Nathalie Baye , Truffaut almost shut the film down for fear of a bad performance: "He would say to me, 'It's madness; it will never work!' And he came close to wanting to stop everything." Baye
SECTION 50
#17330941502477800-494: The 73-year-old Maxime Weygand . He also named the 84-year-old Philippe Pétain , a hero of the First World War , as deputy prime minister. Neither Weygand nor Pétain felt the Germans could be defeated, and they began looking for a way out of the war. On 8 June, the sound of distant artillery fire could be heard in the capital. Trains filled with refugees departed Gare d'Austerlitz with no announced destination. On June 10th,
7950-936: The Caen cemetery and the Carbec Chapel in Saint-Pierre-du-Val . The chapel was used for Davenne's shrine to the dead, with Jean-Pierre Kohut-Svelko designing the set inside. Among the portraits included in the shrine are Henry James , Oscar Wilde , an old man who played a small role in Truffaut's Two English Girls , actor Oskar Werner in a World War I uniform, Jacques Audiberti , Jean Cocteau , Maurice Jaubert , Raymond Queneau , Jeanne Moreau and her sister Michelle Moreau, Louise Lévêque de Vilmorin , Aimée Alexandre, Oscar Lewenstein , Marcel Proust , Guillaume Apollinaire and Sergei Prokofiev , many of whom were idolised figures of Truffaut's . Filming began on October 11, 1977 and lasted until November 27, 1977. The atmosphere on
8100-562: The French army stopped fighting. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler arrived on June 24th for a rapid tour by car, his only visit to Paris. He was guided by the German sculptor Arno Breker and by his chief architect, Albert Speer , both of whom had lived in Paris. He saw the Opera House and viewed the Eiffel Tower from the terrace of the Palace of Chaillot , paid homage at Napoleon's tomb, and visited
8250-400: The French government fled Paris, first to Tours and then to Bordeaux . Thousands of Parisians followed their example, filling the roads out of the city with automobiles, tourist buses, trucks, wagons, carts, bicycles, and on foot. The slow-moving river of refugees took ten hours to cover thirty kilometers. Within a few days, the wealthier arrondissements of the city were nearly deserted, and
8400-572: The French police. Unmarried persons and couples without children were taken to Drancy , some 20 kilometers north of Paris, while 8,160 men, women and children comprising families went to the Vélodrome d'Hiver ("Vel' d'Hiv'") stadium, on rue Nelaton in the 15th arrondissement , where they were crowded together in the heat of summer, with hardly any food, water and no hygienic facilities for five days before being sent to Drancy , Compiègne , Pithiviers and Beaune-la-Rolande internment camps, preludes to
8550-476: The French population against the Germans. Most Parisians, however, only expressed their anger and frustrations in private, while the police of Paris, under German control, received every day hundreds of anonymous denunciations by Parisians against other Parisians. Finding food soon became the first preoccupation of the Parisians. The authorities of the German occupation transformed French industry and agriculture into
8700-467: The French underworld before the war. By the time that the Germans arrived in Paris, two-thirds of the Parisians, particularly those in the wealthier neighborhoods, had fled to the countryside and the south of France, in what is known as the exode de 1940 , the massive exodus of millions of people from the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, the north and east of France, fleeing after the German victory of
8850-504: The German military at Fort Mont Valérien. Acts of resistance in Paris became more dangerous. In the spring of 1942, five students of the Lycée Buffon decided to protest the arrest of one of their teachers. About one hundred students took part, chanting the teacher's name and throwing leaflets. The demonstrators escaped, but the police tracked down and arrested the five student leaders, who were tried and executed on February 8, 1943. As
9000-399: The Germans and many of them made their way to Germany ( Sigmaringen ) when Paris fell to the Allies. Those who did not leave were the target of the purge ( épuration ) that followed. The most notorious criminal of the period was Doctor Marcel Petiot . Petiot purchased a house at 21 rue Le Sueur in the 16th arrondissement , and under the name of Docteur Eugène , pretended to be the head of
9150-484: The Germans were arrested and tried, eight thousand convicted, and 116 executed. On April 29th and May 13th 1945, the first post-war municipal elections were held, in which French women voted for the first time. In the spring of 1939, war with Germany already seemed inevitable. In Paris, the first defense exercise took place on February 2nd 1939 and city workers began digging twenty kilometers of trenches in city squares and parks to be used for bomb shelters. On 10th of March,
SECTION 60
#17330941502479300-413: The Germans. For Parisians, the occupation was a series of frustrations, shortages and humiliations. A curfew was in effect from nine in the evening until five in the morning; at night, the city went dark. Rationing of food, tobacco, coal and clothing was imposed from September 1940. Every year the supplies grew more scarce and the prices higher. A million Parisians left the city for the provinces, where there
9450-489: The Germans. Very few heard the broadcast at the time, but it was widely printed and circulated afterwards. On 23 June, the German occupation authorities ordered all French persons to turn in any weapons and short-wave receivers they possessed, or face severe measures. Within Paris, opposition was isolated and slow to build. On 2 August, de Gaulle was condemned to death for treason, in absentia , by Marshal Pétain's new government. The first illegal demonstration in Paris against
9600-505: The Government of Marshal Pétain and with the Germans, assisting them with city administration, the police, and other government functions. French government officials were given the choice of collaborating or losing their jobs. On September 2, 1941, all Paris magistrates were asked to take an oath of allegiance to Marshal Petain. Only one, Paul Didier , refused. Unlike the territory of Vichy France , governed by Marshal Pétain and his ministers,
9750-795: The Normandy invasion approached, the Communists and their allies controlled the largest and best-armed resistance groups in Paris: the Francs-Tireurs et Partisans (FTP). In February 1944, the FTP became part of a larger umbrella organization, the Forces françaises de l'intérieur (FFI). Following the Normandy invasion on June 6 (D-Day), the FFI prepared to launch an uprising to liberate
9900-424: The Occupation took place on November 11th 1940, the anniversary of the end of the First World War , a day that usually featured patriotic ceremonies of remembrance. Anticipating trouble, the German authorities banned any commemoration and made it a regular school and work day. Nonetheless, the students of Paris lycées (high schools) circulated handbills and leaflets calling for students to boycott classes and meet at
10050-427: The Occupation. In 1946, the metro station Jacques Bonsergent was named after him. The first significant Resistance organization in Paris was formed in September 1940 by a group of scholars connected with the Musée de l'Homme , the ethnology museum located at the Palais de Chaillot . On December 15th, using the museum mimeograph machine, they published Résistance , a four-page newspaper which gave its name to
10200-424: The Paris streets dropped from 350,000 before the war to just under 4,500. One customer, sitting on the terrace of a café on the Place de la Bourse , counted the number of cars which passed between noon and twelve-thirty: only three came by. Older means of transportation, such as the horse-drawn fiacre came back into service. Trucks and automobiles that did circulate often used gazogene, a poor-quality fuel carried in
10350-424: The Parisians was strictly rationed, following the creation on 16 June 1940 of the Ministère de l'agriculture et du ravitaillement (Ministry of Agriculture and Supply), which began to impose a system of rationing as early as August 2nd 1940, as per Décret du 30 juillet 1940 : bread, fat, flour products, rice, sugar; then, on 23 October 1940: butter, cheese, meat, coffee, charcuterie , eggs, oil; in July 1941: and as
10500-410: The Piano Player and noticed that half the actors had since died. In an interview with L'Humanité-Dimanche magazine Truffaut asked "Why not have the same range of feelings for the dead as for the living, the same aggressive or affectionate relationship?" and added that he wanted to film "what it would be like to show on screen a man who refuses to forget the dead." According to him, The Green Room
10650-400: The Soviet Union attacked Poland , but the war seemed far away until May 10th 1940, when the Germans attacked France and quickly defeated the French army. The French government departed Paris on June 10th, and the Germans occupied the city on June 14th. During the occupation, the French government moved to Vichy , and Paris was governed by the German military and by French officials approved by
10800-514: The Special Brigades. The Germans supported the creation by Vichy France, on February 28th 1943, of a fascist paramilitary organization, the Front révolutionnaire national , whose active police branch was called Milice . Its particular function was to help the Germans in their battle against the Resistance, which they qualified as being a "terrorist" organization. It established its headquarters in
10950-597: The US company for the first time in over ten years. His next film, made independently of American influence, would be L'amour en fuite / Love on the Run . Truffaut premiered The Green Room in the US at the 1978 New York Film Festival , where its reception was again ill-fated. Vincent Canby , writing for The New York Times , gave the film a mixed review and criticized Truffaut's performance, saying that: 'Truffaut does not make it easy for us to respond to Davenne'. Canby went on to call
11100-759: The actor Fernandel , the film director and playwright Sacha Guitry , and the singers Édith Piaf , Tino Rossi , Charles Trenet and Yves Montand . The jazz musician Django Reinhardt played with the Quintette du Hot Club de France for German and French fans. In 1941, Maurice Chevalier performed a new revue in the Casino de Paris : Bonjour Paris . The songs Ça sent si bon la France and La Chanson du maçon became hits. The Nazis asked Chevalier to perform in Berlin and sing for Radio Paris . He refused but did perform for French prisoners of war in Germany, and succeeded in obtaining
11250-490: The ambiguity of the word in the context of this funeral film) and even his dead; mixing together Julien Davenne's dead with those of François Truffaut in the flaming chapel where the film comes to an end.' Joel Magny called Davenne the ultimate 'truffaldian' hero, 'unable to live the present moment in the fullness of his being, where he is...in a perpetual time-lag with reality'. The French magazine Télérama called Davenne 'l'homme qui aimait les flammes' ('the man who loves
11400-495: The applause of the audience. Truffaut had wanted to create a film set during the French occupation period for a long time, as his uncle and grandfather were both part of the French Resistance , and were once caught while passing messages. This event was eventually recreated in The Last Metro . Truffaut was inspired by the actor Jean Marais ’s autobiography, basing the film on this and other documents by theatre people from during
11550-485: The armaments factories, which were now producing for the Germans. Many individual communists opposed the Nazis, but the ambivalent official attitude of the Party lasted until Operation Barbarossa , the German attack on the Soviet Union on June 22nd 1941. The Ukrainian-Jewish Marxist historian , Maximilien Rubel , was living semi-secretly in Paris, and was astonished by the level of ignorance shown by Marxist members of
11700-598: The artist's quarter of Montmartre . During the Occupation, the French Government moved to Vichy, and the flag of Nazi Germany flew over all the French government buildings. Signs in German were placed on the main boulevards, and the clocks of all France were reset to the German time. The German military high command moved into the Majestic Hotel on Avenue Kléber ; the Abwehr (German military intelligence), took over
11850-605: The authority over the coal mines of northern France from Paris to their military headquarters in Brussels. The priority for the coal that did arrive in Paris was for use in factories. Even with ration cards, adequate coal for heating was almost impossible to find. Supplies for normal heating needs were not restored until 1949. Paris restaurants were open but had to deal with strict regulations and shortages. Meat could only be served on certain days, and certain products, such as cream, coffee and fresh produce were extremely rare. Nonetheless,
12000-469: The benefit of the German army photographers and newsreel cameramen. On the evening of June 16th, Prime Minister Reynaud resigned. On the morning of June 17th, General de Gaulle left Bordeaux by plane for London. At midday, Parisians gathered around radios heard Pétain, the new head of the French government, announce: "It is with a heavy heart that I tell you today that we must cease hostilities. The fighting must stop." Though no armistice had yet been signed,
12150-401: The betrayal. When Davenne first visits Cécilia at home, Davenne discovers that the living room is full of pictures of Massigny and, without asking for explanations, leaves. At the chapel, Cecilia tells him that she was one of Massigny's many women and still loves him. She requests that Massigny be represented by one of the candles on the altar. After being rebuffed by Davenne, Cecilia breaks off
12300-630: The châteaux of the Loire Valley and the unoccupied zone , and were safe. The German Army was respectful of the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 and refused to transfer the works in French museums out of the country, but the Nazi leaders were not so scrupulous. On 30 June 1940, Hitler ordered that all art works in France, public and private, should be "safeguarded". Many of the French wealthy Jewish families had sent their art works out of France before leaving
12450-456: The city before the Allied Armies and General de Gaulle arrived. The Green Room (film) The Green Room ( French : La Chambre verte ) is a 1978 French historical drama film directed by François Truffaut , based on the 1895 short story " The Altar of the Dead " by Henry James , in which a man becomes obsessed with the dead people in his life and builds a memorial to them. It
12600-482: The city began to distribute gas masks to civilians, and on March 19th, signs were posted guiding Parisians to the nearest shelters. On August 23rd, Parisians were surprised to read that the German foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop , and Russian minister Vyacheslav Molotov had signed the Hitler-Stalin Pact of non-aggression. L'Humanité , the daily newspaper of the French Communist Party (PCF), welcomed
12750-407: The city hall of each arrondissement , was put into place to administer the program. The system resulted in long lines and frustrated hopes, since promised products often never appeared. Thousands of Parisians regularly made the long journey by bicycle to the countryside, hoping to come back, with vegetables, fruit, eggs and other farm products. The rationing system also applied to clothing: leather
12900-449: The country, but others had left their art collections behind. A new law decreed that those who had left France just before the war were no longer French citizens, and their property could be seized. The Gestapo began visiting bank vaults and empty residences, and collecting the works of art. The pieces left behind in the fifteen largest Jewish-owned art galleries in Paris were also collected, and transported in French police vans. In September,
13050-494: The country. They were not experienced conspirators, and they were discovered and arrested in January 1941. Vildé and the six other leaders were sentenced to death and executed by firing squad at Fort Mont Valérien , in the western suburbs of the city, on February 22, 1942. Most of the resistance by ordinary Parisians was symbolic: encouraged by the BBC, students scribbled the letter V for Victory on walls, blackboards, tables, and on
13200-568: The cult of death and the love of the life?" Truffaut replied "it's the theme of the film." Gillain wrote that the film "points to cinema as a celebration of memory." Yet, also thematic throughout The Green Room is a familiar "estrangement from human contact and romantic obsession", which has been prominent in "most of the films that Truffaut has made over a period of twenty years." Truffaut chose pre-recorded music from composer Maurice Jaubert 's 1936 "Concert Flamand", whose work he had already used four times, and played it on set in order to create
13350-503: The curfew meant they had to catch the last Métro train home. Upon its release in theatres on 17 September 1980, The Last Metro became one of Truffaut's more commercially successful films. In France it had 3,384,045 admissions and in the United States it grossed $ 3 million. At the 6th César Awards , The Last Metro received 12 nominations and won 10 of them, including Best Film . The film also received Best Foreign Film nominations at
13500-419: The current production and make plans for Lucas to escape the country. However, Marion soon becomes infatuated with the oblivious Bernard, whom Lucas only knows from a headshot and snippets of conversation overheard through a rigged heating vent. Unbeknownst to anyone at the theater, Bernard is a member of the Resistance group responsible for delivering the bomb that killed a German admiral. The opening night of
13650-538: The day before Truffaut began shooting his first feature, The 400 Blows . Truffaut told a reporter for L'Express : "I'm faithful to the dead, I live with them. I'm forty-five and already beginning to be surrounded by dead people." In 1977 Truffaut lost two other important father-figures: Cinémathèque Française director Henri Langlois and Roberto Rossellini , whom Truffaut called "the most intelligent man, with André Bazin " during an interview with Le Matin de Paris . Around this time Truffaut had watched Shoot
13800-469: The dead. This theme for a film had "preoccupied him for several years and had been accentuated by the deaths of numerous friends and colleagues", such as those who previously worked alongside him on Shoot the Piano Player . Nonetheless, the alternative theme of the film again reflects Truffaut's sense of personal expressionism throughout his career. When asked "what do you make of the contradiction between
13950-565: The deportation of French Jews to the concentration camp of Auschwitz . On May 29th, 1942, all Jews in the Occupied Zone over the age of six were required to wear the yellow Star of David badge . In July, Jews were banned from all main streets, movie theaters, libraries, parks, gardens, restaurants, cafés and other public places, and were required to ride on the last car of metro trains. On 16–17 July 1942, on Germans' orders, 13,152 Jews (4,115 children, 5.919 women and 3,118 men) were rounded up by
14100-535: The document of surrender placed Paris in the occupied zone, directly under German authority, the Militärbefehlshabers in Frankreich (MBF). It stated: "The government of France will immediately invite all the French authorities and administrative services in the occupied territories to conform with the regulations of the German military authorities, and to collaborate with those in a correct manner." The prefect of
14250-504: The film 'a most demanding, original work and one must meet it on its own terms, without expectations of casual pleasures'. Dave Kehr , in the Chicago Reader , said that the film 'dead-ends in sheer neurosis' while praising the cinematography. A negative review from Time Out blamed the film's 'failure' on 'Truffaut's lack of range as an actor [which] is not helped by the script's purple prose'. Truffaut himself eventually reflected on
14400-412: The film a Gothic look, Almendros used candle light as both source and practical lighting, with electrical lights used to "exploit the contrast between electric light and a flood of candlelight to give the film a ghostly quality." Truffaut also intended a resulting lack of colour throughout filming, condemning colour as a removal of the final "barrier" between film and reality: "If there is nothing false in
14550-417: The film and hired renowned press agent, Simon Misrahi, in his determination to make the film reach a larger audience, despite its subject matter. A few days before the film's premiere, Truffaut completely changed his approach, putting more emphasis on his own track record as a filmmaker and the presence of rising star, Nathalie Baye. In a television appearance to promote the film, Truffaut showed two scenes from
14700-421: The film that had nothing to do with the dead. Truffaut was extremely upset by the film's financial failure, and referred to it as "The Empty Room". He publicly stated that he would not act again for at least ten years, and admitted to Paris Match that he regretted not casting Charles Denner in the lead role. Truffaut later blamed United Artists for not promoting the film properly, which led to his breaking from
14850-472: The film, as he did not like Truffaut’s directing style, but he was subsequently convinced that he should take part. Most of the filming took place in an abandoned chocolate factory on Rue du Landy in Clichy , which was converted into a studio. During shooting Deneuve suffered an ankle sprain from a fall, resulting in having to shoot scenes at short notice. Scriptwriter Suzanne Schiffman was also hospitalised with
15000-465: The film, but Truffaut received high praise elsewhere. Pascal Bonitzer viewed the film as 'most profound, and without much exaggeration, one of the most beautiful French films of recent years', and that 'it is not for nothing that Truffaut embodies his character, and that in the latter, Julien Davenne, the author and the actor are entwined in the tightest possible way...rarely does a filmmaker involve himself to that point - involving his body (and note all
15150-538: The film. Truffaut also wanted to change the setting of the original story to 1920s France with World War I as a major factor in the plot. In fact, he stated that he chose to adapt Henry James’ 1928 themes because he wanted to link them directly with the memory of the First World War. The idea of massacre, millions of deaths, is not evoked as effectively by the Second World War. By spring 1975, Gruault had finished
15300-479: The final draft in May 1977. For the lead role of Julien Davenne, Truffaut first wanted to cast actor Charles Denner , but he was not available. Because of the personal nature of the film and the character of Julien Davenne, Truffaut decided to play the part, stating that "this film is like a handwritten letter. If you write by hand, it isn’t perfect, the writing may be shaky, but it is you, your writing." . This decision
15450-452: The first German advance guard entered the city at Porte de La Villette and took the rue de Flandres toward the center. They were followed by several German columns, which, following an established plan, moved to the principal intersections. German military vehicles with loudspeakers circulated, instructing Parisians not to leave their buildings. At eight in the morning, delegations of German officers arrived at Les Invalides , headquarters of
15600-485: The flames'). Jean-Louis Bory of Le Nouvel Observateur wrote that: 'In its simple and pure line, it resembles a cinematic testament. There will be other Truffaut films, but none that will ever be more intimate, more personal, more wrenching than this Green Room , altar of the dead.' The Green Room was released on April 5, 1978 and was a financial failure, selling slightly more than 30,000 tickets (it has sold 161,293 admissions total as of 2015). Truffaut knew that
15750-598: The forced departure to factories in Germany of many young Frenchmen, as part of the Service du travail obligatoire (STO), "Obligatory Work Service". The attitude of the Parisians toward the occupiers varied greatly. Some saw the Germans as an easy source of money; others, as the Prefect of the Seine, Roger Langeron (arrested on June 23rd 1940), commented, "looked at them as if they were invisible or transparent." The attitude of members of
15900-554: The former Communist Party building at 44 rue Le Peletier and at 61 rue de Monceau . The Lycée Louis-Le-Grand was occupied as barracks, and an officer candidate school was established in the Auteuil synagogue. The Front révolutionnaire national held a large rally on April 11th 1943 at the Vél d'Hiv . At the time of the Liberation of Paris in August 1944, most of its members chose to fight alongside
16050-460: The guillotine on May 25, 1946. The gold, silver and other valuables were not found when he was arrested. In search of the treasure, the house was carefully demolished in 1966, but no trace of it was ever found. On June 18th 1940, Parisians listening to the BBC heard an obscure French brigadier General, Charles de Gaulle, in London, make an appeal ( Appel du 18 juin ) to continue the resistance against
16200-455: The head of the Luftwaffe , visited the Jeu de Paume on November 3 and returned on the 5th, spending the entire day there, picking out works for his private collection. He selected twenty-seven paintings, including works by Rembrandt and Van Dyck owned by Edouard de Rothschild , as well as stained glass windows and furniture intended for Carinhall , the luxurious hunting lodge he had built in
16350-405: The height of her beauty. During a thunderstorm, a fire destroys the green room, Davenne managing to save only pictures and portraits of his wife. On discovering an abandoned chapel in ruins, at the same cemetery where Julie is buried, Julien decides to consecrate it not only to his wife but to all the cemetery's dead, having reached "that point in life where you know more dead than alive." The place
16500-456: The last time, Marion enters to bid him farewell, and the two share a passionate encounter on the floor. After the war ends, Bernard returns to the theater to star in a new play written by Lucas during his time in hiding. On opening night, Marion, who plays the female lead, expresses her desire to share her life with Bernard, but he confesses that he never truly loved her. As the curtain falls, Bernard, Marion, and Lucas stand hand-in-hand to receive
16650-560: The liberation of ten prisoners in exchange. The writer Colette , who was 67 when the war began, worked quietly on her mémoires in her apartment at 9 rue du Beaujolais , next to the gardens of the Palais-Royal. Her husband, Maurice Goudeket, a Jew, was arrested by the Gestapo in December 1941, and although he was released after a few months through the intervention of the French wife of the German ambassador Otto Abetz , Colette lived through
16800-541: The military governor of Paris, Henri Dentz , and at the Prefecture of Police, where the Prefect, Roger Langeron, was waiting. The Germans politely invited the French officials to put themselves at the disposition of the German occupiers. By the end of the afternoon, the Germans had hung a swastika flag at the Arc de Triomphe and organized military parades with a marching band on the Champs Élysées and Avenue Foch , primarily for
16950-474: The movement that followed. The group was led by the Russian-born (French naturalized) anthropologist Boris Vildé . The first issue of the newspaper, proclaimed: "We are independent, simply French, chosen for the action we wish to carry out. We have only one ambition, one passion, one desire: to recreate France, pure and free." They collected information and established a network to help escaped French POWs to flee
17100-463: The next killing of a German, forty-eight hostages were immediately shot by firing squad. From London, General de Gaulle condemned the Communist policy of random assassinations, saying the cost in innocent civilian lives was too high, and it had no impact on the war, but the random shooting of Germans continued. In retaliation, an estimated 1,400 hostages from the Paris region were taken and 981 executed by
17250-399: The occupation, by Paris students, took place on November 11 1940. As the war continued, anti-German clandestine groups and networks were created, some loyal to the French Communist Party , others to General Charles de Gaulle in London. They wrote slogans on walls, organized an underground press, and sometimes attacked German officers. Reprisals by the Germans were swift and harsh. Following
17400-465: The occupation. This film was one installment - dealing with theatre - of a trilogy on the entertainment world envisaged by Truffaut. The installment that dealt with the film world was 1973's La Nuit américaine ( Day for Night ), which had won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film . Truffaut completed the screenplay for the third installment, L'Agence magique , which would have dealt with
17550-535: The pact, writing: "At the moment when the Soviet Union makes a new and appreciable contribution to safeguard the peace, constantly threatened by the fascist instigators of war, the French Communist Party addresses its warmest greetings to the country of socialism, to its party and to its great leader Stalin ". In Paris, the copies of the newspaper and of the other Communist newspaper, Ce Soir , were seized by
17700-646: The paintings that they left without taking anything. He also persuaded them that the paintings in the adjoining vault, owned by Braque, were actually his own. Other "degenerate" artists, including Kandinsky and Henri Matisse , who sent drawings up to Paris from his residence in Nice, were officially condemned but continued to sell their works in the back rooms of Paris galleries. A few actors, such as Jean Gabin and film director Jean Renoir chose, for political or personal reasons, to leave Paris, but many others remained, avoided politics and focused on their art. These included
17850-428: The patriotic demonstrations on November 11. But after Operation Barbarossa , the German attack on the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941, they became among the most active and best-organized forces against the Germans. They remained hostile to de Gaulle, whom they denounced as a reactionary British puppet. On 21st of August 1941, a 21-year-old veteran communist named Pierre Georges , who used the clandestine name "Fabien", shot
18000-694: The police and prefect of the Seine, reported to him, and only secondarily to the government of the French State in Vichy. The Reich Security Main Office , which oversaw the SS , SD and the Gestapo , worked closely with the French Police and its auxiliaries. It established the Carlingue (or French Gestapo) which was used to conduct counter-insurgency operations against the Resistance . Its cadre, which were mostly from
18150-464: The police and their publication suspended. On August 31st, anticipating bombardment, the French government began to evacuate 30,000 children out of the city to the countryside. That night, street lights were turned off as a measure against German air raids. On 1 September, news reached Paris that Germany had invaded Poland , and France as expected promptly declared war on Germany. On August 27th, in anticipation of air raids, workmen had begun taking down
18300-469: The population of the working-class 14th arrondissement dropped from 178,000 to 49,000. The British General Staff urged the French to defend Paris street-by-street, but Pétain dismissed the idea: "To make Paris into a city of ruins will not affect the issue." On June 12th, the French government, in Tours, declared Paris to be an open city, that there would be no resistance. At 5:30 in the morning of June 14th,
18450-590: The primary destination for the rest and recreation of German soldiers. Under the slogan "Jeder einmal in Paris" ("everyone once in Paris"), each German soldier was promised one visit to Paris. One month after the beginning of the Occupation, a bi-monthly magazine and guide for visiting German soldiers Der Deutsche Wegleiter für Paris (The German Guide to Paris), was first published by the Paris Kommandantur . Certain hotels and movie theaters were reserved exclusively for German soldiers. A German-language newspaper,
18600-417: The production sees a full house, but a scathing review in a newspaper the following morning condemns the show as being "Jewish." The anti-Semitic writer behind the review aims to oust Marion and take control of her theater. While the cast and crew celebrate their initial success at a nightclub, the same writer, at another gathering, falsely accuses Bernard of insulting Marion, leading to a physical altercation in
18750-433: The relationship and he breaks down. He locks himself away at home, refusing to eat, to see the doctor, or talk. The managing editor of The Globe recommends that Cécilia write him a letter. She finally declares her love, knowing he would never reciprocate, "because to be loved by you, I should be dead." Having forgiven Massigny, Davenne joins her in the chapel, but he is weakened, falls to the ground and dies. Cécilia completes
18900-449: The resistance that he met, and in consequence he introduced the term " Marxologie " to refer to a systematic scholarly approach to the understanding of Marx and Marxism, which he perceived to be needed. For the Parisians, the Occupation was a series of frustrations, shortages and humiliations. A curfew was in effect from nine in the evening until five in the morning; at night, the city went dark. Rationing of food, tobacco, coal and clothing
19050-401: The rest of the war years with the anxiety of a possible second arrest. In 1944, she published one of her most famous works, Gigi . The philosopher and novelist Jean-Paul Sartre continued to write and publish; Simone de Beauvoir produced a broadcast on the history of the music hall for Radio Paris; and Marguerite Duras worked at a publishing house. The actress Danielle Darrieux made
19200-467: The restaurants found ways to serve their regular clients. The historian René Héron de Villefosse [ fr ] , who lived in Paris throughout the war, described his experience: "The great restaurants were only allowed to serve, under the fierce eye of a frequent control, noodles with water, turnips and beets, in exchange for certain number of tickets, but the hunt for a good meal continued for many food-lovers. For five hundred francs one could conquer
19350-428: The semi-autobiographical The 400 Blows (1959), it has been noted that Truffaut often portrayed personal experiences and emotions throughout his films. Via such expressionistic use of the medium, he proclaimed himself as a film auteur , within a theory of film as art which he personally advocated as a director and a critic. As a result, Truffaut's films often appeared to focus on certain themes and stylisations, such as
19500-465: The set was especially fun and Nathalie Baye revealed that she and Truffaut often had laughing fits during takes. However, she also admits to having found it difficult to receive comprehensive direction from Truffaut, as he remained highly focused on his own performance. Baye also had difficulty performing alongside Truffuat, due to his "expressionless, nearly mechanical" approach to acting, which required her to adjust her own approaches accordingly. Since
19650-539: The side of cars. The Germans tried to co-opt the 'V' campaign, placing huge Vs. symbolizing their own victories, on the Eiffel Tower and the National Assembly, but with little effect. From the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in August 1939, until June 1941, the Communists played no active part in the Resistance. The Vichy government and Germans allowed their newspapers to publish, and they made no mention of
19800-521: The stained glass windows of the Sainte-Chapelle . The same day, curators at the Louvre , summoned back from summer vacation, and aided by packers from the nearby La Samaritaine and Bazar de l'Hôtel de Ville department stores, began cataloging and packing the major works of art, which were put into crates and labeled only with numbers to disguise their contents. The Winged Victory of Samothrace statue
19950-420: The street. On another occasion, two Gestapo agents, disguised as air raid wardens, conduct a search of the theater, prompting Marion to turn to Bernard in desperation for help in concealing Lucas and his belongings. Following the arrest of Bernard's Resistance contact during a Gestapo raid, Bernard resolves to devote his life to the Resistance cause and abandon acting. As he prepares to leave his dressing room for
20100-450: The students, and closed the entrance of the metro stations. They charged the students with fixed bayonets, firing shots in the air. The Vichy government announced 123 arrests and one student wounded. The students arrested were taken to the prisons of La Santé , Cherche-Midi and Fresnes , where they were beaten, slapped, stripped, and made to stand all night in the pouring rain. Some students were threatened by soldiers pretending to be
20250-466: The themes of The Green Room , reread Marcel Proust 's Remembrance of Things Past and Japanese literature such as the works of Jun'ichirō Tanizaki . He also asked Éric Rohmer for help with the script, but the material thus far produced did not interest the director. In October 1976, Truffaut showed a new draft to Gruault, which now included a deaf-mute child as the main character Julien Davenne's protégé, and had Davenne work as an obituary writer in
20400-446: The vitality of youth and childhood, particularly embodied by the character of Antoine Doinel , who is a recurring presence across a number of his films. The Green Room however was made towards the end of Truffaut's career, and thematically the film contrasts to his earlier works. The Green Room appears to reminisce on childhood, whilst focusing more on the final stages of life, as Truffaut expresses his views of death and remembrance of
20550-509: The war continued, the Resistance was divided largely between the groups, followers of General de Gaulle in London, and those organized by the Communists. Thanks to pressure from the British, who supplied the weapons, and the diplomacy of one Resistance leader, Jean Moulin , who created the National Council of the Resistance ( Conseil National de la Résistance (CNR)), the different factions began to coordinate their actions. In early 1944, as
20700-526: The war went on: chocolate, fish, dried vegetables, (like peas and beans), potatoes, fresh vegetables, wine, tobacco... Products could be bought only upon presentation of coupons attributed to specific items and on the specific week in which they could be used. Parisians (and all the population of France) were divided into seven categories depending upon their age, and allotted a certain amount of each product each month. A new bureaucracy, employing more than nine thousand city employees, with offices at all schools and
20850-602: The work, as she had asked the first time, dedicating one last candle to Julien Davenne. Truffaut first began work on The Green Room in December 1970 after reading the works of Henry James . Truffaut especially liked " The Altar of the Dead " and asked his friend Aimée Alexandre to translate a new French version for him. Alexandre also recommended works by Anton Chekov and Leo Tolstoy with similar themes, while Truffaut did his own research on James's life and visited his home in Boston . Truffaut worked on other projects until 1974, when
21000-409: The world of music hall . In the late 1970s, he was close to beginning filming, but the failure of his film The Green Room forced him to look to a more commercial project, and he filmed Love on the Run instead. Truffaut began casting in September 1979, and wrote the role of Marion especially with Catherine Deneuve in mind, for her energy. Gérard Depardieu initially did not want to be involved in
21150-616: Was carefully wheeled down the long stairway on a wooden ramp to be put on a truck for its departure to the Château de Valençay in the Indre department. Trucks used to move scenery for the Comédie Française were used to move the larger paintings, including Gericault 's Raft of the Medusa . The art works were carried in slow convoys of trucks, convoys, with headlights off to observe the blackout, to
21300-477: Was cast as Cécilia after having worked with her in Day for Night and The Man Who Loved Women . Baye later stated that "If Francois asked me to perform with him, it was because he knew I wasn't the kind of actress who caused problems. He could rely on me, which was very reassuring to him." Truffaut filled out the cast with Jean Dasté as Davenne's boss at The Globe , Antoine Vitez as a clergyman, Jean-Pierre Moulin as
21450-457: Was initiated in September 1940. Every year the supplies grew more scarce and the prices higher. The French press and radio broadcast only German propaganda. The beginning of the STO, the program that required large number of young Frenchmen to work in factories for the German war industry, in exchange for the return of older and sick French prisoners of war in Germany, greatly increased the resentment of
21600-433: Was more food and fewer Germans. The French press and radio contained only German propaganda. Jews in Paris were forced to wear the yellow Star of David badge , and were barred from certain professions and public places. On July 16–17 1942, 13,152 Jews, including 4,115 children, were rounded up by the French police , on orders of the Germans, and were sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp . The first demonstration against
21750-767: Was murdered at the Flossenbürg concentration camp on 7 March 1945. The Germans made a continual effort to seduce the Parisians through culture: in 1941, they organized a festival of German music by the Berlin Philharmonic at the Paris Opera, a play from the Schiller Theater in Berlin at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées , and an exhibit by the German sculptor Arno Breker . The French film industry, based in suburbs of Paris, had
21900-404: Was not simply taken because Truffaut embodied the character, but because Davenne’s obsession, what he does throughout the whole film, what defines him, that is, keeping the memory of the dead alive, refusing to forget them, linked in a way to the activity of the director. Specifically, he felt a closeness to the character of Davenne, due to his own valuations of remembrance of the dead as helping in
22050-517: Was officially condemned as "degenerate" , his paintings continued to be sold at the Hôtel Drouot auction house and at the Galerie Louise Leiris , formerly Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler 's. German treasurer officials opened Picasso's bank vault, where he stored his private art collection, searching for Jewish-owned art they could seize. Picasso so confused them with his descriptions of ownership of
22200-565: Was purely passive, waiting for the Germans to attack. After eight months of relative calm (known as the Phoney War , La drôle de guerre ) on the Western Front , the Germans struck France on May 10th 1940, bypassing the Maginot Line and slipping through the Ardennes . By May 15th, German panzer divisions were only 35 kilometers from Laon , in the rear of the French and British armies, racing toward
22350-434: Was reserved exclusively for German army boots, and vanished completely from the market. Leather shoes were replaced by shoes made of rubber or canvas ( raffia ) with wooden soles. A variety of ersatz or substitute products appeared, which were not exactly what they were called: ersatz wine, coffee (made with chicory), tobacco and soap. Finding coal for heat in winter was another preoccupation. The Germans had transferred
22500-410: Was the best to accompany the memory of all these dead." However, an infrequent use of music throughout the final film sees a consistent quietness take place, which is regarded to have masked "an exploration of human isolation in an inhuman society and of the strength and limitations of moral and aesthetic purity." Gillain wrote that the film is cut like a musical composition and that each scene "performs
#246753