A Monkey in Winter | |
---|---|
Directed by | Henri Verneuil |
Written by | François Boyer Michel Audiard |
Based on | novel A Monkey in Winter by Antoine Blondin |
Produced by | Jacques Bar |
Starring | Jean Gabin Jean-Paul Belmondo Suzanne Flon |
Cinematography | Louis Page |
Edited by | Monique and Françoise Bonnot |
Music by | Michel Magne |
Distributed by | UFA-Comacico |
Release date |
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Running time | 105 minutes |
Country | France |
Language | French |
Box office | 2,417,209 admissions (France) [1] |
A Monkey in Winter (French : Un singe en hiver) is a 1962 French comedy-drama film directed by Henri Verneuil. It is based on the novel A Monkey in Winter by Antoine Blondin. [2] Set in a Normandy seaside town, it recounts the meeting and parting of two men at odds with life, one an old hotel keeper who dreams of dashing deeds in pre-war China and the other a young advertising executive who imagines he is an incarnation of Hispanic masculinity.
With his dutiful but unimaginative wife Suzanne, Albert Quentin runs a small hotel in a little town on the coast of Normandy. After an exciting career as a marine in the French Navy, during which he served in China, he is bored and takes to drink. In June 1944 he is on a binge with his neighbour Esnault, who runs a bar, when the Allies launch a huge air raid. Finding his way back to his cellar, he comforts his terrified wife there and promises her that if their hotel stays intact he will give up drink. After fifteen years of sobriety, and more bored than ever, on a quiet winter night a nervous young man books in to the hotel. This is Gabriel Fouquet, who goes over to Esnault's bar and after ringing his wife who has left him and gone to Madrid, gets thoroughly drunk. Albert, who gets up to bring him in from the street and put him to bed, warms to the lonely stranger. Each has a dream world into which he retreats from reality: Albert relives and embellishes his exotic adventures in China, while Gabriel sees himself as an epitome of Spanish machismo, dancing flamenco and fighting bulls.
In the morning, Gabriel buys a sweater for a ten-year-old girl from an eccentric shopkeeper called Landru and visits the convent where his daughter Marie is a boarder. Too on edge to see her, he runs away when she is called. Albert and Suzanne in their different ways try to be kind to him, but he will keep drinking and causing upsets. One fateful night Albert succumbs and the two get roaring drunk. They visit a brothel Albert has not entered for fifteen years, though only to drink, start a fight in Esnault's bar, and cajole the shopkeeper Landru into setting off his stock of fireworks on the beach. When they force their way into the convent to abduct Marie, they are confronted by the head nun in a wheelchair, who repels them and says Marie will be released at ten in the morning. Gabriel collects his daughter then and the two are joined on the Paris train by a chastened Albert, who has once more renounced alcohol and is going to visit his father's grave inland. Albert tells Marie how in China lost monkeys creep into the towns during winter and, once there are enough of them, the people organise a train to take them all back to their native forests. He gets out at Lisieux, to face his own long winter.
Bosley Crowther of The New York Times wrote that while "nothing great or profound is offered in this whimsey", "this moodily masculine story has a strong strain of wistfulness that laces its robust humor and gives it more than merely comic quality." [3] He applauded the performances of all the main actors. [3]
Un singe en hiver was shot in Villerville. [4] Villerville celebrated the film's 50th anniversary with many events from 30 June to 20 October 2012. [5]
Henri Désiré Landru was a French serial killer, nicknamed the Bluebeard of Gambais. He murdered at least seven women in the village of Gambais between December 1915 and January 1919. Landru also killed at least three other women and a young man in the house he rented from December 1914 to August 1915 in the town of Vernouillet, a town 35 kilometres (22 mi) northwest of Paris. The true number of Landru's victims is suspected to be higher.
Smash-Up, the Story of a Woman, also called A Woman Destroyed, is a 1947 American drama film with elements of film noir that tells the story of a rising nightclub singer who marries another singer and becomes an alcoholic after sacrificing her career for him.
Monsieur Verdoux is a 1947 American black comedy film directed by and starring Charlie Chaplin, who plays a bigamist wife killer inspired by serial killer Henri Désiré Landru. The supporting cast includes Martha Raye, William Frawley, and Marilyn Nash.
Deauville is a commune in the Calvados department, Normandy, northwestern France. Major attractions include its harbour, race course, marinas, conference centre, villas, Grand Casino, and hotels. The first Deauville Asian Film Festival took place in 1999. As the closest seaside resort to Paris, Deauville is one of the most notable seaside resorts in France. The city and its region of the Côte Fleurie have long been home to the French upper class's seaside houses and is often referred to as the Parisian riviera.
Villerville is a commune in the Calvados department in the Normandy region in northwestern France. The commune is located towards the eastern end of the 40 km (25 mi) coastline called the Côte Fleurie.
Henri Verneuil was a French-Armenian playwright and filmmaker, who made a successful career in France. He was nominated for Oscar and Palme d'Or awards, and won Locarno International Film Festival, Edgar Allan Poe Awards, French Legion of Honor, Golden Globe Award, French National Academy of Cinema and Honorary Cesar awards.
A Heart in Winter is a 1992 French romantic drama film co-written and directed by Claude Sautet. It stars Daniel Auteuil, Emmanuelle Béart and André Dussollier. It was chosen to compete at the 49th Venice International Film Festival, where it won four awards, tying for the Silver Lion. It was nominated for Best Film Not in the English Language at the 47th British Academy Film Awards.
Georges de Beauregard was a French film producer who produced works by many of the French New Wave directors. In 1968, he was a member of the jury at the 18th Berlin International Film Festival. In 1983 he was awarded a Special César Award, the French national film prize.
François Périer was a French actor renowned for his expressiveness and diversity of roles.
The Rue de Montmorency is a street in the historic Le Marais quarter of Paris, part of the city's 3rd arrondissement. It runs from the Rue du Temple to the Rue Saint-Martin.
Françoise Bonnot was a French film editor with more than 40 feature film credits.
Paul Michel Audiard was a French screenwriter and film director, known for his witty, irreverent and slang-laden dialogues which made him a prominent figure on the French cultural scene of the 1960s and 1970s. He was the father of French film director Jacques Audiard.
Guillaume Fouquet de la Varenne was a French chef who became an important statesman in the service of Henry IV.
Gabriel Gobin was a Belgian film actor. He appeared in more than 100 films between 1947 and 1990. He was born in Hacquegnies, Belgium and died in Brie-Comte-Robert, France.
In Case of Adversity is a 1958 French-Italian crime film directed by Claude Autant-Lara and starring Jean Gabin, Brigitte Bardot and Edwige Feuillère. It was released as Love Is My Profession in the United States. It tells the story of a married lawyer who rigs a trial to acquit a young female criminal he has become obsessed with, even to the point of imagining they might have a life together and start a family. The screenplay was written by Jean Aurenche and Pierre Bost after the novel In Case of Emergency by Georges Simenon. The film was released in France on 17 September 1958.
Edmond Séchan was a French cinematographer and film director.
Sacha Briquet (1930–2010) was a French actor, born in Neuilly-sur-Seine.
A Monkey in Winter is a 1959 novel by the French writer Antoine Blondin. It tells the story of a reformed alcohol addict who runs a small hotel in Normandy and has promised his wife to never drink alcohol again. To support a guest, a man who is nervous because he is to meet his daughter for the first time, he tells war stories and begins to drink to infuse courage. An English translation by Robert Baldick was published in 1960.
Ernest Ange Duez was a French painter of genre scenes, portraits, landscapes and religious subjects.
Paris, Palace Hotel is a 1956 French-Italian romantic comedy film directed by Henri Verneuil and starring Charles Boyer, Françoise Arnoul and Tilda Thamar. It was shot in Eastmancolor at the Boulogne Studios in Paris. The film's sets were designed by the art director Jean d'Eaubonne.
C'est aussi dans ce village que Henri Verneuil a posé ses cameras pour la réalisation du Film Un Singe en Hiver, il y a 50 ans.In French.