Georges Franju
Born: April 12, 1912
Died: November 5, 1987
in Fougères, Ille-et-Vilaine, France
Died: November 5, 1987
in Fougères, Ille-et-Vilaine, France
Georges Franju was a French filmmaker. He was born in Fougères, Ille-et-Vilaine. Before working in French cinema, Franju had several different jobs. Franju was also briefly in the military in Algeria and was discharged in 1932. On his return, Franju studied to become a set designer and later created backdrops for music halls including Casino de Paris and the Folles Bergère.
In the mid-thirties, Franju and Henri Langlois met through Franju's twin brother Jacques Franju. As well as creating the 16 mm short film Le Métro, Langlois and Franju also started a short-lived film magazine and created a film club called Le Cercle du Cinema with 500 francs he borrowed from Langlois' parents. The club showed silent films from their own collections followed by an informal debate about them amongst members. From Le Cercle du Cinema, Franju and Langlois founded the Cinématheque Française in 1936.
Franju ceased to be closely related with the Cinématheque Française as early as 1938, and only became associated with it strongly again in the 1980s when he was appointed as the honorary artistic director of the Cinématheque.
In 1949, Franju began work on a series of nine documentary films. The Nazi occupation of Paris and the industrialism following World War II influenced Franju's early works. With Head Against the Wall (French:La tête contre les murs) in 1958, Franju turned toward fiction feature films. His second feature was the horror film Eyes Without a Face (French:Les Yeux sans Visage) about a surgeon who tries to repair his daughter's ruined face by grafting on to it the faces of beautiful women. His 1963 film Judex was a tribute to the silent film serials Judex and Fantomas. In Franju's later years his film work became less frequent. Franju occasionally directed for television and in the late seventies he retired from filmmaking to preside over the Cinématheque Française. In her study of French cinema since the French new wave, Claire Clouzot described Franju's film style as "a poignant fantastic realism inherited from surrealism and Jean Painlevé science cinema, and influenced by the expressionism of Lang and Murnau". Franju's focus was on the visual aspect of filmmaking, which he claimed marked a director as an auteur. Franju claimed to "not have the story writing gift" and was focused on what he described as the "putting into form" of the film.
Franju was also extremely influenced by surrealism. He used elements of surrealism and shock horror within his films in order to “awaken” his audience. Franju had a long history of friendship with well-known surrealists including Andre Breton, and the influence of this movement is extremely evident in his works. Franju uses these elements to link horror, history, and an ironic commentary on modernity’s ideal of progress. Franju is quoted as having said “It’s the bad combination, it’s the wrong synthesis, constantly being made by the eye as it looks around, that stops us from seeing everything as strange.”
Description above from the Wikipedia article Georges Franju , licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
In the mid-thirties, Franju and Henri Langlois met through Franju's twin brother Jacques Franju. As well as creating the 16 mm short film Le Métro, Langlois and Franju also started a short-lived film magazine and created a film club called Le Cercle du Cinema with 500 francs he borrowed from Langlois' parents. The club showed silent films from their own collections followed by an informal debate about them amongst members. From Le Cercle du Cinema, Franju and Langlois founded the Cinématheque Française in 1936.
Franju ceased to be closely related with the Cinématheque Française as early as 1938, and only became associated with it strongly again in the 1980s when he was appointed as the honorary artistic director of the Cinématheque.
In 1949, Franju began work on a series of nine documentary films. The Nazi occupation of Paris and the industrialism following World War II influenced Franju's early works. With Head Against the Wall (French:La tête contre les murs) in 1958, Franju turned toward fiction feature films. His second feature was the horror film Eyes Without a Face (French:Les Yeux sans Visage) about a surgeon who tries to repair his daughter's ruined face by grafting on to it the faces of beautiful women. His 1963 film Judex was a tribute to the silent film serials Judex and Fantomas. In Franju's later years his film work became less frequent. Franju occasionally directed for television and in the late seventies he retired from filmmaking to preside over the Cinématheque Française. In her study of French cinema since the French new wave, Claire Clouzot described Franju's film style as "a poignant fantastic realism inherited from surrealism and Jean Painlevé science cinema, and influenced by the expressionism of Lang and Murnau". Franju's focus was on the visual aspect of filmmaking, which he claimed marked a director as an auteur. Franju claimed to "not have the story writing gift" and was focused on what he described as the "putting into form" of the film.
Franju was also extremely influenced by surrealism. He used elements of surrealism and shock horror within his films in order to “awaken” his audience. Franju had a long history of friendship with well-known surrealists including Andre Breton, and the influence of this movement is extremely evident in his works. Franju uses these elements to link horror, history, and an ironic commentary on modernity’s ideal of progress. Franju is quoted as having said “It’s the bad combination, it’s the wrong synthesis, constantly being made by the eye as it looks around, that stops us from seeing everything as strange.”
Description above from the Wikipedia article Georges Franju , licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Movies for Georges Franju...
Title: Aznavour by Charles
Character: Self - Filmmaker (archive footage)
Released: October 2, 2019
Type: Movie
In 1948, French singer Charles Aznavour (1924-2018) receives a Paillard Bolex, his first camera. Until 1982, he will shoot hours of footage, his filmed diary. Wherever he goes, he carries his camera with him. He films his life and lives as he films: places, moments, friends, loves, misfortunes.
Title: The Story of French Fantasy Cinema
Character: Self (archive footage)
Released: January 31, 2019
Type: Movie
The story of the French fantasy cinema from Méliès to Raw.
Title: Georges Franju - Le visionnaire
Character: Self (archive footage)
Released: September 2, 1998
Type: Movie
Made for "Cinéma, de notre temps" series. Interview with Georges Franju (1912-1987), a figure of immense importance in the history of French cinema, not primarily for his films (exceptional though many of these are) but for being the co-founder, with Henri Langlois, of the Cinémathèque Française in 1936, France's most famous and important film archive.
Title: Franju, l'avion et la DS
Character: Self
Released: January 1, 1987
Type: Movie
At the editing table, Georges Franju comments on two sequences from his film, Les Yeux sans visage. Episode of the TV program "Cinéma, cinémas".
Title: Rendez-vous avec Fantômas
Character: Self
Released: September 15, 1966
Type: Movie
A portrait of feuilleton author, Marcel Allain, creator of one of Franju’s favourite heroes: Fantômas.
Title: La Nouvelle Vague par elle-même
Character: Self
Released: May 19, 1964
Type: Movie
Made for Cinéastes de notre temps series. In 1964, several French New Wave auteurs discuss the success and crisis of the wave. Featuring Claude Chabrol, François Truffaut, Jacques Rivette, Jean-Luc Godard, Jacques Rozier, Jacques Demy, Agnès Varda, Jean Rouch, and many others.
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