Biography
Born in Paris, Claude Chabrol was evacuated from the war-torn city and grew up in the village of Sardent, where he and a friend set up a makeshift cinema in a barn. Returning to Paris after it was liberated, Chabrol became a fixture in the post-war cinémathèques, where he met the young Turks of film criticism, Cahiers du Cinéma?s François Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard and Eric Rohmer, men with whom he shared an artistic vision. A long-time admirer of Fritz Lang and Alfred Hitchcock, Chabrol was asked to contribute articles to Cahiers, a publication for which he would continue to write for many years.
In 1958, Chabrol returned to Sardent to shoot his first film, Le Beau Serge (Handsome Serge) with money from his then-wife?s inheritance. It was a triumph: direct and simplistic in style, the film is credited as the first film of the French New Wave movement. He followed this critical and artistic success with Les Cousins, which won the Golden Berlin Bear at the 1959 Berlin International Film Festival.
Chabrol continued to surprise his audiences through his early filmmaking years, directing a number of genre films such as the mystery Les Bonnes Femmes (The Good Time Girls, 1960) the comedy piece l?Avarice for the portmanteau film, The Seven Deadly Sins (1962) and the spy film The Tiger Likes Fresh Blood (1964). Maintaining a keen interest in the psychological aspects of his characters, Chabrol worked regularly within the thriller genre, exemplified by his highly-regarded Hélène cycle, and in particular, 1970?s Le Boucher.
It was not until the late Seventies that Chabrol was nominated for his first Palme d?Or at Cannes, for the thriller Violette Nozière (1978) starring Isabelle Huppert. While missing out on the prestigious award, the Cannes jury awarded the Best Actress award to Huppert. His adaptation of Gustave Flaubert?s classic novel Madame Bovary (1991) is probably his biggest international success, being nominated for an Oscar® and a Golden Globe Award.
Chabrol continues to make films today and, in his late 70s, shows no signs of tiring, with his 2008 feature La Fille Coupée en Deux (A Girl Cut in Two) winning the Venice Film Festival?s Filmcritica "Bastone Bianco" Award. His propensity towards directing artistic thrillers and mysteries has placed him alongside the likes of Hitchcock and Lang, company he no doubt enjoys.
