Biography
Born to bookshop owners in Niort, western France, Henri-Georges Clouzot moved to Brest with his family in 1922 and there graduated from naval school. Unable to pursue a maritime career due to myopia, he moved to Paris, reporting for the Paris-Midi newspaper. While interviewing Adolphe Osso, the producer offered him translation and screenwriting work at Babelsberg Studio in Berlin, and there Clouzot remained—drinking in the expressionism of Murnau and Lang—until 1934, when he was sent home for associating with Jews.
On his return, Clouzot was hospitalised with tuberculosis, spending the next five years in sanatoria. During his convalescence he read voraciously, honing his storytelling skills. Returning to Paris in 1938, he found the film industry devastated, as directors and producers fled the Nazi invasion. He joined the scriptwriting division of the German-operated Continental Films and was promoted to director with 1942’s l’Assassin Habite au 21. His second feature, the hit poison-pen thriller Le Corbeau (1943), was denounced by the right-wing Vichy, the leftist Résistance and the Catholic church. Although fired by Continental two days before its release, Clouzot was deemed a collaborator by the post-war government and banned from filmmaking for life, later reduced to two years after support from Sartre, Cocteau, René Clair and Marcel Carné.
By 1947, Clouzot was back in the game, his noir tale Quai des Orfèvres a critical and commercial triumph. He followed this with a Golden Lion at Venice for 1949’s Manon, but it was The Wages of Fear (1953) that really put Clouzot on the international map, winning the Grand Prix at Cannes, a Best Film BAFTA and the Golden Berlin Bear. Clouzot’s now-evident predilection for deception, betrayal and suspense provoked a rivalry with Alfred Hitchcock, and the two vied to film Les Diaboliques (1955), which history attests, Clouzot very successfully won.
The Mystery of Picasso (1956), a documentary on his old friend, followed, then Les Espions (1957) which featured his actress wife Véra in her final role. He made the Brigitte Bardot thriller La Verité in 1960 (still her highest-grossing film) and his final film, La Prisonnière in 1968, attempting to parlay his skills to the nouvelle vague generation. One of France’s most consistently successful directors, Henri-Georges Clouzot, Master of Suspense, died in Paris, and is buried with first wife Véra in the Montmatre cemetery.
