Jean Martin

Jean Martin

Born: March 6, 1922
Died: February 2, 2009
in Paris, France
Jean Martin (6 March 1922 - 2 February 2009) was a French actor. Coming from a Berry family, he spent part of his childhood in Biarritz, where his father worked for a furrier. During the Second World War, he hid to escape the Forced Labor Service. Staying in Paris, he appeared in two films by Maurice Tourneur: "The Devil's Hand" (1942) then "Cécile Est Mort" (1943). At the twilight of the forties, he started doing theater.

In 1953, Jean Martin gained notoriety by playing the new play by Irish playwright Samuel Beckett, "Waiting for Godot", under the direction of Roger Blin, becoming the first to take on the role of Lucky. The same Roger Blin produced “End of the Game” (1957), by the same Beckett, a few years later, and entrusted the same Jean Martin with the role of Clov. In 1960, Jean Martin staged his first play, “Letter Dead”, by Robert Pinget. In 1962, he again staged a play, “The Representatives”, by Aglaé and Mona Mitropoulos, adapted by Michel Arnaud. Alongside this theatrical career which would prove to be rich, Jean Martin returned to cinema: “Notre-Dame de Paris” (1956), by Jean Delannoy, “Paris belongs to us” (1958), by Jacques Rivette, “Ballade for a thug " (1962), by Jean-Claude Bonnardot, "La foire aux dunces" (1963), by Louis Daquin and "À toi de fait mignon" (1963), by Bernard Borderie.

In 1960, he was a signatory of the Manifesto of the 121 entitled “Declaration on the right to insubordination in the Algerian war”. In 1965, a role marked his career, that of Colonel Mathieu, in a film retracing the struggle in 1957 for control of the Casbah district of Algiers between FLN militants and French soldiers: "The Battle of Algiers" . Three years after the end of the Algerian War, the subject is still sensitive on each side of the Mediterranean; the film was banned in France upon its release, then censored until 2004. Jean Martin, very convincing in this role of division commander (historically, the commander is General Massu, but the character is inspired by Colonel Bigeard), is the only professional actor in the film. His large stature, his strong personality and his imperious face predispose him to notable roles generally showing authority: chief doctor, police commissioner, high-ranking military officer, ecclesiastical dignitary...; one of the most impressive will undoubtedly be that of a doctor vehemently expelling from his hospital a judge Fayard, Patrick Dewaere, a bit of a cavalier in "Le Juge Fayard Dit Le Shérif" (1976). Claude Zidi mocks these roles in his comedies: principal in “La moutarde monte au nose” (1974), bank director in “La Course À L'Échalote” (1975), chief doctor in “L'aile ou la thigh” (1976), principal inspector in “Bête mais disciplined” (1979) and examiner in “Inspecteur la Bavure” (1980). Alongside Jean-Paul Belmondo, he is… cardinal in “L’Hériter” (1972) and… divisional commissioner in “Peur Sur La ville” (1975)! But also alongside Terence Hill in “My Name is Nobody” (1973) in the role of Sullivan, or “One Genius, Two Associates, One Bell (1975).

After devoting a large part of his career to the theater, appearing in around fifty films, Jean Martin died on February 2, 2009, in Paris.

Movies for Jean Martin...

Marxist Poetry: The Making of The Battle of Algiers
Title: Marxist Poetry: The Making of The Battle of Algiers
Character: Self
Released: August 1, 2004
Type: Movie
To commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS, we revisited our edit of the film and interviews with director Gillo Pontecorvo and producer Saadi Yacef, who discuss the process of representing Algeria's struggle for independence and the challenges of presenting a balanced view of the conflict.
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Lucie Aubrac
Title: Lucie Aubrac
Character: Paul Lardanchet
Released: February 26, 1997
Type: Movie
A love story or a tale of the resistance, this poignant movie tells both the haunting story of a French resistance cell in Lyon but also the love of Lucie Aubrac for her husband...
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Title: Les Jupons de la révolution
Character: Marquis de persan
Released: July 19, 1989
Type: TV
TV Show Details
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Le crime d'Ovide Plouffe
Title: Le crime d'Ovide Plouffe
Character: Sculpteur
Released: August 29, 1984
Type: Movie
Ovide Plouffe has married Rita. She still tries to attract other men even after their marriage. Unhappy Ovide feels for Marie - a young French woman he had met. But his catholic background and surrounding can't let him love another woman or divorce from his wife. So Ovide finishes with Marie and plans a trip with Rita hoping for reconciliation. At the last instant he announces to Rita that he can't make the trip. She goes alone. The plane explodes, and Ovide is suspected and arrested for this horrible crime.
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La Puce et le privé
Title: La Puce et le privé
Character: Gérard Le Tizou, head waiter
Released: March 11, 1981
Type: Movie
Val Brosse, a private detective, receives Françoise, who confesses to him that she murdered her husband. The story is false, but Val, intrigued, decides to investigate.
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Inspector Blunder
Title: Inspector Blunder
Character: Examination policeman (uncredited)
Released: December 3, 1980
Type: Movie
A detective, fresh out of the academy (lowest mark in class), gets the assignment to bodyguard a spoiled rich girl reporter. She's been interviewed on TV and has questioned the virility of a mobster who kidnaps her later.
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The King and the Mockingbird
Title: The King and the Mockingbird
Character: L’oiseau (voice)
Released: March 19, 1980
Type: Movie
The kingdom of Takicardie quakes under the rule of the tyrannical King Charles V-et-III-font-VIII-et-VIII-font-XVI, whose favourite pastime is shooting birds. His archenemy is a cheeky mockingbird, whose favourite pastime is thwarting the king’s attempts to shoot birds. One night, a portrait of the king comes to life and disposes of the real king, taking his place. The portrait king falls in love with a young shepherdess in another painting and intends to marry her. But, alas, the shepherdess has fallen in love with a chimneysweep and together they elope from the king’s palace. Enraged, the king sends his police to capture them and once they are within his power he forces the shepherdess to marry him. The mockingbird must use all his guile and courage to once more thwart the king and bring his evil reign to an end.
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The Associate
Title: The Associate
Character: M. Bastias
Released: August 22, 1979
Type: Movie
An unemployed investor creates a fictious business partner to attempt to improve business. Eventually, his creation gets out of control as his business becomes successful and his wife announces that she is in love with the partner and his son wishes the partner was his father -- although no one has ever seen him. To regain control, the man decides to "kill" his imaginary partner and is arrested for the murder.
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Dossier 51
Title: Dossier 51
Character: Vénus
Released: August 30, 1978
Type: Movie
French diplomat Dominique Auphal is put under surveillance by an unnamed secret service. They wish to find a weakness in his life in order to control him politically. Auphal becomes "File no. 51": his private life is spied, analysed and commented.
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The Cat
Title: The Cat
Character: Legrand
Released: April 27, 1977
Type: Movie
Amedeo and Ofelia, middle aged brother and sister, own jointly an old decadent, but still attractive, condominium. They want to sell it, but before they have to evict all the tenants. Of course, these don't want to leave at all. The cat (Il Gatto), mascot and beloved by all, dies and this gives the two an excuse to enter the tenants' life. Amedeo starts to court the young Wanda and Ofelia seduces the priest Don Pezzolla. In the meantime police is looking for the cat killer...
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Title: Rendez-vous en noir
Character: Le commissaire
Released: February 24, 1977
Type: TV
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Judge Fayard Called the Sheriff
Title: Judge Fayard Called the Sheriff
Character: Le docteur
Released: January 12, 1977
Type: Movie
Jean-Marie Fayard is a young examining magistrate in a large provincial french city. He belongs to that generation of judges who are endeavoring to re-adapt the notion of justice to our changing times. His methods are not agreeable to every one. Criticism and pressure are brought to bear upon him but he is aware of his value, professionally, and refuses to make any concessions. He follows an unwavering course. He uses dynamic methods and takes uncustomary initiatives. He behaves like a crusader, a battler, whence the nickname given him by the reporters : the sheriff.
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The Carpathian Castle
Title: The Carpathian Castle
Character: Orfanik, the Inventor
Released: December 19, 1976
Type: Movie
In 1898, strange things happen in a castle not far from the small village of Werst in the Carpathian mountains of Transylvania. Twenty years earlier, the castle had been abandoned due to some nefarious dealings there but a shepherd sees smoke coming out of the chimney, which stirs up the village with whispers Chort (a demon) is now occupying the place. Count Franz de Télek, a visitor to the area, becomes intrigued by all this turmoil and decides to investigate. Made for French television and based on the 1892 Jules Verne novel of the same name.
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A Woman at Her Window
Title: A Woman at Her Window
Character: Drieu La Rochelle (uncredited)
Released: November 10, 1976
Type: Movie
Greece, 1936. An aristocratic woman engages in a series of loveless affairs before finding herself falling for a political activist.
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Le Gentleman des Antipodes
Title: Le Gentleman des Antipodes
Character: Sainte-Rose
Released: November 4, 1976
Type: Movie
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The Wing or the Thigh?
Title: The Wing or the Thigh?
Character: Le médecin de Duchemin à la clinique
Released: October 27, 1976
Type: Movie
Charles Duchemin, a well-known gourmet and publisher of a famous restaurant guide, is waging a war against fast food entrepreneur Tri- catel to save the French art of cooking. After having agreed to appear on a talk show to show his skills in naming food and wine by taste, he is confronted with two disasters: his son wants to become a clown rather than a restaurant tester and he, the famous Charles Duchemin, has lost his taste!
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Title: Police Commissioner Moulin
Character: Larsen
Released: August 4, 1976
Type: TV
The series follows the adventures of lighthearted Jean-Paul Moulin, a police Commissaire, and his team as they solve crimes.
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A Genius, Two Friends, and an Idiot
Title: A Genius, Two Friends, and an Idiot
Character: Colonel Pembroke
Released: December 16, 1975
Type: Movie
Expert conman Joe Thanks teams up with half-breed Bill and naive Lucy to steal $300,000 from the Indian-hating Major Cabot. Their elaborate plan is full of disguises, double-crosses, and chases, but Joe always seems to know what he's doing.
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The Messiah
Title: The Messiah
Character: Pontius Pilate
Released: October 24, 1975
Type: Movie
Rossellini takes numerous liberties with the original source material, rearranging and omitting events at will, presenting everything in a highly undramatic fashion. The film begins in the time of the Old Testament, allowing Rossellini to present the story of Jesus in its ancient, historic context.
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The Wild Goose Chase
Title: The Wild Goose Chase
Character: Le directeur de la banque
Released: October 8, 1975
Type: Movie
The whole intrigue is centered around carte-blanche documents kept in a vault. Whoever fills in the blank becomes the owner of a revue. Big money is involved. The nephew of the owner of the vault is trying to cheat his uncle and have his name in the documents. Everything is even more complicated because the manager of the bank has a finger in the pie, too. Who but a humble bank-teller (Pierre Richard) will ruin the scheme?
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Fear Over the City
Title: Fear Over the City
Character: Commissaire divisionnaire Sabin
Released: April 9, 1975
Type: Movie
A serial-killer frightens Paris by phoning young ladies at night, telling them insults about their lives. Minos, as he calls himself, wants to prevent the world from free women and he targets at first these ones. Commissaire Letellier is given the investigation and he has hard work with the maniac.
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Une invitation à la chasse
Title: Une invitation à la chasse
Character: Le marquis de la Rocherie
Released: November 1, 1974
Type: Movie
Claude Chabrol film for TV based on the short story An Invitation to the Hunt by Georges Hitchcock. Receiving an unexpected invitation to participate in the annual hunt party given by the local marquis, a common man deludes himself into thinking he’s a valued member of society, gets in debt to live up to his own fantasies, puts on airs, and invents a perfectly untrue—but, to his mind, fitting—past for a man of his new station. Then the cruel game starts.
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The Time of the Beginning
Title: The Time of the Beginning
Character: Direttore clinica / Sottocapo
Released: October 15, 1974
Type: Movie
A "symbolic" character traces the path of man in search of salvation in this world within his own ghosts and deformations.
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I'm Losing My Temper
Title: I'm Losing My Temper
Character: Headmaster
Released: October 9, 1974
Type: Movie
Pierre is a clumsy, overly serious math teacher at an all-girls high school. His life is thrown into chaos after encountering a beautiful British actress and the paparazzi that follow her around.
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Cry of the Heart
Title: Cry of the Heart
Character: M. Bunkermann
Released: September 11, 1974
Type: Movie
Alexandre, a young man from a wealthy family, suffers a serious fall. One leg is finally amputated, leaving the other paralyzed. Desperate, the boy tries to come to terms with his new existence. He quickly adopts a cruel attitude towards those closest to him, blackmailing the house gardener and his mother, who has a lover. Obsessed with sex, he is unable to have an affair with a girl and ends up committing suicide.
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Successive Slidings of Pleasure
Title: Successive Slidings of Pleasure
Character: The Priest
Released: March 7, 1974
Type: Movie
A young woman is questioned by the police and the judges, suspected of being a modern witch. The girl who shared her apartment has been found dead, and a pair of scissors impaled through her heart, as she lay attached to the bedposts. Apparently, the girl does have powers, to make all people around her fall prey to her spell, glissing progressively into desire, lust, and the unknown.
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My Name Is Nobody
Title: My Name Is Nobody
Character: Sullivan
Released: December 13, 1973
Type: Movie
Jack Beauregard, an ageing gunman of the Old West, only wants to retire in peace and move to Europe. But a young gunfighter, known as "Nobody", who idolizes Beauregard, wants him to go out in a blaze of glory. So he arranges for Jack to face the 150-man gang known as The Wild Bunch and earn his place in history.
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The Day of the Jackal
Title: The Day of the Jackal
Character: Victor Wolenski
Released: May 16, 1973
Type: Movie
An international assassin known as ‘The Jackal’ is employed by disgruntled French generals to kill President Charles de Gaulle, with a dedicated gendarme on the assassin’s trail.
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The Inheritor
Title: The Inheritor
Character: Mgr. Schneider
Released: March 22, 1973
Type: Movie
After his father is killed in a plane crash, Bart Cordell returns back home to France to claim his inheritance: to lead the industrial empire his father built. But when a prostitute tries to set him up for a drug smuggling charge, he is forced to accept that his father may have been assassinated and that the killers are out to get him as well...
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The Beguines
Title: The Beguines
Character: René
Released: September 19, 1972
Type: Movie
Hélène, a fragile and romantic teenager, discovers that her father, a rich business man, has a mistress. Curious, she decides to go and meet this woman who is described as strange. At the first chance she has she goes to her house in the Ramparts of Béguines... from then on she goes back often, discovering a new world of artists and nightowls where she also experiences love in the arms of Tamara.
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La nuit bulgare
Title: La nuit bulgare
Released: April 20, 1972
Type: Movie
A youngish sales employee of a computer firm is blackmailed into helping a group of mysterious Bulgarian industrialists who have come to his office. A government contract is being sought for a businessman who is in danger of bankruptcy.
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HPW ou Anatomie d'un faussaire
Title: HPW ou Anatomie d'un faussaire
Released: July 27, 1971
Type: Movie
Hugo-Paul de Weydroos, forger who manages to mystify the most renowned experts, is an attractive man, not without talent but paranoid and megalomaniac. He lived a childhood in the Paris of the 1920s, upset by his love of drawing and painting thwarted by an abusive mother. Delivered to his own fantasies, the hero indulges in the most disordered introspection and will end up consuming himself to become the reincarnation of the one he is trying to copy: Hans Pauli Weyergans, painter of the 18th century.
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Troubleshooters
Title: Troubleshooters
Character: Homme de Varèse
Released: April 7, 1971
Type: Movie
The day he is released from jail, Serge is expected by four killers sent by Count Charles Varèse assigned to make him confess where he has hidden the jewels stolen during his last stickup. On the other hand the police inspector who arrested him offers him protection on condition he gives him the same piece of information. Serge refuses and is about to be tortured by Varèse's henchmen when Michel, a friendly hood, comes to his rescue. His friendship will result in... a heap of corpses! —Guy Bellinger
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Promise at Dawn
Title: Promise at Dawn
Character: Igor Igorevitch
Released: November 25, 1970
Type: Movie
A single mother raises her son in impossible circumstances first in Leningrad, then Krakow, and then France, and is over-ambitious about him but never gives in.
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Safety Catch
Title: Safety Catch
Released: April 7, 1970
Type: Movie
A doctor disbarred for euthanasia is called in by a man to help his son, who has been depressed since the suicide of his partner. But in the dead woman's handbag, an undeveloped film is discovered by the doctor, who decides to investigate the young woman's alleged suicide.
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Don't Take God's Children for Wild Geese
Title: Don't Take God's Children for Wild Geese
Character: A henchman of Charles (uncredited)
Released: September 6, 1968
Type: Movie
Rita is a girl that lives on taking gangsters as lovers. But when the money stops coming, she swears revenge.
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Title: Baal's Companions
Character: M. De Plassans
Released: July 29, 1968
Type: TV
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The Companions of Baal
Title: The Companions of Baal
Character: Mauvouloir
Released: July 29, 1968
Type: Movie
Journalist Claude Leroy (Jacques Champreux) reports that a secret society, The Companions of Baal, is behind a hold-up in the small town of Blaingirey. They are led by the Grand Maître Hubert de Mauvouloir (Jean Martin). An adorant of Lucifer, he aims to enslave the world. Accompanied by their acolyte, Pierrot Robichat (Gérard Zimmermann), and a young girl, Françoise Cordier (Claire Nadeau), Claude Leroy is determined to finally reveal the mysteries of the group's criminal enterprise.
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Je T'Aime, Je T'Aime
Title: Je T'Aime, Je T'Aime
Character: Un responsable d'édition
Released: April 24, 1968
Type: Movie
Recovering from an attempted suicide, a man is selected to participate in a time travel experiment that has only been tested on mice. A malfunction in the experiment causes the man to experience moments from his past in a random order.
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The Invention of Morel
Title: The Invention of Morel
Character: Stoewer
Released: December 8, 1967
Type: Movie
Escaped from jail, Luis finds refuge on a remote island where, it is said, several people have died long ago of a mysterious illness. He discovers a large abandoned villa. One day, a group of people from another time, come in. The villa and the nature around become the theater of strange phenomena…
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Title: Graf Yoster gibt sich die Ehre
Character: Gaston
Released: September 15, 1967
Type: TV
Graf Yoster gibt sich die Ehre [French title: Le comte Yoster a bien l'honneur] is a TV series which followed the adventures of the title’s amateur gentleman detective. It was a success in particular in Germany and in France. Originally the show was a German production in black-and-white but it evolved into a European co-production in colour.
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Les filous
Title: Les filous
Released: January 1, 1967
Type: Movie
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Soldier Martin
Title: Soldier Martin
Character: Monnier
Released: September 28, 1966
Type: Movie
A troupe of French actors on tour in Normandy become involved in the events of WWII.
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The Battle of Algiers
Title: The Battle of Algiers
Character: Colonel Philippe Mathieu
Released: September 8, 1966
Type: Movie
Tracing the struggle of the Algerian Front de Liberation Nationale to gain freedom from French colonial rule as seen through the eyes of Ali from his start as a petty thief to his rise to prominence in the organisation and capture by the French in 1957. The film traces the rebels' struggle and the increasingly extreme measures taken by the French government to quell the revolt.
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The Nun
Title: The Nun
Character: Monsieur Hébert
Released: May 6, 1966
Type: Movie
In eighteenth-century France, a girl is forced against her will to take vows as a nun. Three mothers superior treat her in radically different ways, ranging from maternal concern, to sadistic persecution, to lesbian desire.
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Your Turn, Darling
Title: Your Turn, Darling
Released: September 25, 1963
Type: Movie
In this French espionage thriller, Eddie again plays the role that made him a star, Lemmy Caution. Lots of two fisted action.
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Les Culottes rouges
Title: Les Culottes rouges
Character: Un homme de la troupe (non crédité)
Released: December 19, 1962
Type: Movie
Antoine Rossi, a recidivist prisoner of war in Germany, manages to escape with the cowardly Fendard. Fendard does everything in his power to help him even though he is wounded, but Antoine tries to get rid of him as he boards the train to freedom.
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Gustave Moreau
Title: Gustave Moreau
Character: Narrator
Released: January 2, 1962
Type: Movie
A brilliant analysis of 19th century French Symbolist painter Gustave Moreau, known for his fantastical and mythological subjects, and who remains to these days an influential figure in the birth of modern art.
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Forgotten Stones
Title: Forgotten Stones
Released: January 1, 1952
Type: Movie
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Cecile Is Dead
Title: Cecile Is Dead
Character: Le garçon d'étage (uncredited)
Released: March 8, 1944
Type: Movie
Cecile, a young girl who goes to the offices of the Judicial Police several times in a row to complain about nightly visits to the apartment she occupies with her aunt, is not taken seriously by the police until she the day she is found murdered.