La Femme de nulle part

Last updated

La Femme de nulle part
La Femme de nulle part.jpg
Directed by Louis Delluc
Starring Ève Francis
Roger Karl
Music by Jean Wiener [1]
Release date
  • 26 July 1922 (1922-07-26)(France)
Running time
61 minutes
CountryFrance
LanguageFrench

La Femme de nulle part (The Woman from Nowhere) is a 1922 French film directed by Louis Delluc. [2] The screenplay was one of three screenplays published under the title Drames du Cinema in 1923. [3]

Contents

Plot

In a villa close to Genoa, a man says goodbye to his wife and young son. He is going to spend one day and one night in the city to take leave of a friend embarking on a boat. An older woman arrives, who had lived many years before in that house. She asks for permission to see again the house and the park. The husband invites her to spend the night. While he is upstairs packing, a young man hides a letter under the staircase leading to the house.

Once the husband has left, his wife retrieves the letter, it is a message from her lover insisting that she should leave her house and elope with him. The older woman watches her from the window of her bedroom while she reads the letter. A moment later, she goes to the young woman's bedroom and sees that she is packing. She tells her that she has lived a similar story many years before but that she shouldn't leave because of her child.

During the evening, the older woman wanders in the park, reminiscing about her past love. The young woman meets her lover who tells her he will be waiting for her in his car the following morning and begs her to come with him. In Genoa, the husband wanders aimlessly in the city and ends up in a bar where a woman tries to seduce him but he rejects the temptation.

In the morning, the older woman has changed her mind, she urges the young woman to follow the call of love and convinces her. But the nurse tells the little boy that his mother is leaving. He runs after her and fall on the ground, calling his mother. She cannot resist her son's cries and goes back to the house, just when her husband is coming back. She asks her husband to protect her. The older woman bids them farewell and walks away sadly on the road, realising she is alone in the world. [4]

Cast

Reception

With hindsight the film has been considered an "early masterpiece of impressionist cinema". [5]

Related Research Articles

<i>A Man and a Woman</i> 1966 film by Claude Lelouch

A Man and a Woman is a 1966 French romantic drama film directed by Claude Lelouch and starring Anouk Aimée and Jean-Louis Trintignant. Written by Pierre Uytterhoeven and Lelouch, the film concerns a young widow and widower who meet by chance at their children's boarding school and whose budding relationship is complicated by the memories of their deceased spouses. The film is known for its lush photography, which features frequent segues among full color, black-and-white, and sepia-toned shots, and for its music score by Francis Lai.

<i>La Fée aux Choux</i> 1896 French lost film by Alice Guy-Blaché

The 1896 version of La Fée aux Choux is a lost film directed by Alice Guy-Blaché that, according to her, featured a honeymoon couple, a farmer, pictures of babies glued to cardboard, and one live baby. The 1900 La Fée aux Choux and the 1902 Sage-Femme de Première Classe are frequently confused with the original lost film, which is arguably the world's first narrative film, and the first film directed by a woman.

<i>The Hairdressers Husband</i> 1990 French film

The Hairdresser's Husband, a 1990 French comedy-drama film written by Patrice Leconte and Claude Klotz, and directed by Leconte. Jean Rochefort stars as the title character. Anna Galiena co-stars.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Germaine Dulac</span> French film director and producer

Germaine Dulac was a French filmmaker, film theorist, journalist and critic. She was born in Amiens and moved to Paris in early childhood. A few years after her marriage she embarked on a journalistic career in a feminist magazine, and later became interested in film. With the help of her husband and friend she founded a film company and directed a few commercial works before slowly moving into Impressionist and Surrealist territory. She is best known today for her Impressionist film, La Souriante Madame Beudet, and her Surrealist experiment, La Coquille et le Clergyman. Her career as filmmaker suffered after the introduction of sound film and she spent the last decade of her life working on newsreels for Pathé and Gaumont.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Louis Delluc</span> French film director

Louis Delluc was an Impressionist French film director, screenwriter and film critic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Françoise Rosay</span> French actress and singer

Françoise Rosay was a French opera singer, diseuse, and actress who enjoyed a film career of over sixty years and who became a legendary figure in French cinema. She went on to appear in over 100 movies in her career.

<i>Diary of a Country Priest</i> 1951 film

Diary of a Country Priest is a 1951 French drama film written and directed by Robert Bresson, and starring Claude Laydu in his debut film performance. A faithful adaptation of Georges Bernanos' novel of the same name, which had won the Grand prix du roman de l'Académie française in 1936, it tells the story of a sickly young Catholic priest who has been assigned a small village in northern France as his first parish. The film was lauded for Laydu's performance, which has been called one of the greatest in the history of cinema, and won numerous awards, including the Grand Prize at the Venice International Film Festival and the Prix Louis Delluc.

<i>England, My England and Other Stories</i>

England, My England is a collection of short stories by D. H. Lawrence. Individual items were originally written between 1913 and 1921, many of them against the background of World War I. Most of these versions were placed in magazines or periodicals. Ten were later selected and extensively revised by Lawrence for the England, My England volume. This was published on 24 October 1922 by Thomas Seltzer in the United States. The first United Kingdom edition was published by Martin Secker in 1924.

<i>The Lower Depths</i> (1936 film) 1936 film

The Lower Depths is a 1936 French drama film directed by Jean Renoir and starring Jean Gabin, Suzy Prim and Louis Jouvet. It is based on the 1902 play of the same title by Maxim Gorky. Its scenes contrast the life of the upper and lower classes to comedic effect. It was shot at the Epinay Studios of Eclair and on location between Epinay and Saint-Denis on the Seine. The film's sets were desgned by the art director Eugène Lourié.

French impressionist cinema refers to a group of French films and filmmakers of the 1920s.

<i>Ten</i> (2002 film) 2002 Iranian film

Ten is a 2002 Iranian docufiction film starring Mania Akbari and Amina Maher. It was released with Abbas Kiarostami credited as the director; however, his role in the film and the source of the footage have been disputed by Akbari since 2020.

<i>La Fête espagnole</i> 1920 film

La Fête espagnole is a 1920 French silent film directed by Germaine Dulac and written by Louis Delluc. It was cited by critic and film historian Georges Sadoul as being first in ushering in French impressionist cinema.

<i>The Letter</i> (1999 film) 1999 French film

The Letter is a 1999 French-Portuguese drama film directed by Manoel de Oliveira. It tells the story of a married woman who has feelings for another man, and who confesses her feelings to her friend, a cloistered nun. The Film is loosely based on the 1678 French novel The Princess of Cleves by Madame de Lafayette.

<i>Water Lilies</i> (film) 2007 film

Water Lilies is a 2007 French drama film and the debut as a screenwriter and director of Céline Sciamma. It won the Louis Delluc Prize for Best First Film at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Noémie Lvovsky</span> French film director, screenwriter, and actress

Noémie Lvovsky is a French film director, screenwriter, and actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Laetitia Masson</span> French film director

Lætitia Masson is a French film director and screenwriter. She has directed twelve films since 1991. Her film À vendre was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ève Francis</span> Actress

Ève Francis was an actress and film-maker. She was born in Belgium but spent most of her career in France. She became closely associated with the writer Paul Claudel, and she was married to the critic and film-maker Louis Delluc.

<i>Mysteries of Lisbon</i> 2010 film

Mysteries of Lisbon is a 2010 Portuguese period drama film directed by Chilean filmmaker Raúl Ruiz based on an 1854 novel of the same name by Camilo Castelo Branco. The movie's running time is 272 minutes. It played as a miniseries in 60-minute installments in some countries. The film has won nine awards and been nominated for eight more.

Roger Karl was a French actor. Karl was born Roger Trouvé in Bourges.

<i>Le Brasier ardent</i> 1923 film by Ivan Mosjoukine

Le Brasier ardent is a 1923 French film directed by Ivan Mosjoukine. It combines elements of comedy, mystery, romance and psychological drama. The title has been variously translated into English as The Blazing Inferno, The Burning Crucible, The Burning Brazier, The Burning Cauldron, and Burning Embers.

References

  1. "Pierre Etaix - Revisiting a Forgotten Master". brightlightsfilm.com. Retrieved 24 March 2014. Wiener had first composed film music for the feature La Femme de nulle part (The Woman from Nowhere, 1922), written and directed by Louis Delluc.
  2. "La Femme De Nulle Part". movies.msn.com. Archived from the original on 24 March 2014. Retrieved 24 March 2014.
  3. Louis Delluc (1923). Drames du Cinema. Paris: Editions du monde nouveau. p. 130.
  4. Review, synopsis and link to watch the film: "A cinema history" . Retrieved 29 October 2015.
  5. "Louis Delluc – La femme de nulle part (1922)". worldscinema.org. Retrieved 24 March 2014.