
Jean Aurenche
Writing
Biography
Jean Aurenche (1903–1992) was a French screenwriter. During his career, he wrote 80 films for directors such as René Clément, Bertrand Tavernier, Marcel Carné, Jean Delannoy and Claude Autant-Lara. He is often associated with the screenwriter Pierre Bost, with whom he had a fertile partnership from 1940 to 1975. In the 1920s and 1930s, Jean Aurenche was friends with some members of the surrealist groups. His sister Marie-Berthe was the wife of Max Ernst and Max Ernst soon became friend with Jean Aurenche. Later, he even appeared in some film commercials directed by Jean Aurenche (for the "Nicolas" Wine, the "Barbes" stores and so on...). Jean Aurenche was also a close friend of Jean Cocteau who helped him publish several of his short stories in the famous "NRF". In 1933, Jean Aurenche co-directed two short documentaries with Pierre Charbonnier: Pirates du Rhône and Bracos de Sologne. He later co-wrote the short film Monsieur Cordon with director Pierre Prévert. He soon turned to screenwriting, writing or co-writing several films like L'affaire du Courrier de Lyon (1936) by Maurice Lehmann and Claude Autant-Lara, L'affaire Lafarge or, more famously, Hôtel du Nord that he co-wrote with Marcel Carné and Henri Jeanson. In 1942, starting with Douce (directed by Autant-Lara), Aurenche formed a longstanding partnership with Pierre Bost. Their method of writing together initially worked as such: Jean Aurenche wrote the treatment of the screenplay (sometimes based on a novel) and Pierre Bost then expanded this outline and wrote the dialogue. But soon, both of them wrote all the script together without any clear division of the writing. Together, Aurenche & Bost wrote several great successes of this time period, often associated with director Claude Autant-Lara : le Diable au corps (1945), l'Auberge rouge (1951), le Rouge et le Noir (1954), la Traversée de Paris (1956). Meanwhile, Aurenche & Bost started a fertile collaboration with Jean Delannoy, writing for him La Symphonie Pastorale (1947) which won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Festival of 1947. During this time, they also worked with René Clément (Au-delà des grilles, Jeux interdits and Gervaise). The film Jeux Interdits won the Academy Award on the Best Foreign Film in 1952 and soon became a classic. All these critic and commercial triumph contributed to make of Aurenche one of the most revered screenwriters of his time. ... Source: Article "Jean Aurenche" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Known For

Life in a small Mexican village where joy and misery, hope and pain, passion and guilt, love and decay, life and death are mixed in the peasants life and two French citizens who end up stranded in there, during a typhoid epidemic.
The Proud and the Beautiful

Paris, 1482. Today is the festival of the fools, taking place like each year in the square outside Cathedral Notre Dame. Among jugglers and other entertainers, Esmeralda, a sensuous gypsy, performs a bewitching dance in front of delighted spectators. From up in a tower of the cathedral, Frollo, an alchemist, gazes at her lustfully. Later in the night, Frollo orders Quasimodo, the deformed bell ringer and his faithful servant, to kidnap Esmeralda. But when the ugly freak comes close to her is touched by the young woman's beauty...
The Hunchback of Notre Dame

A tale of the tender relationship between a twelve-year-old boy and the fourteen-year-old upperclassman who is the object of his desire, all set within the rigid atmosphere of a Jesuit-run school.
This Special Friendship

No description available.
Molière pour rire et pour pleurer

Orphaned after a Nazi air raid, Paulette, a young Parisian girl, runs into Michel, an older peasant boy, and the two quickly become close. Together, they try to make sense of the chaotic and crumbling world around them, attempting to cope with death as they create a burial ground for Paulette's deceased pet dog. Eventually, however, Paulette's stay with Michel's family is threatened by the harsh realities of wartime.
Forbidden Games

A green mare makes the fortune of her owner, the horse dealer Haudouin. Shortly after his death, war broke out in 1870. One day, his neighbor Zèphe Maloret denounces Honoré, Haudouin's son, a maverick, to the Prussians. Following this denunciation, their non-commissioned officer enters the Haudouin home and rapes the mother while Honoré is hidden under the bed. The resentment already existing between the Haudouin and Maloret families turns to hatred... A letter recalling the events is lost, which doesn't help matters.
The Green Mare

On the meandering Canal St. Martin, at the Parisian Hôtel du Nord, a nearly fatal gunshot separates a dejected young couple. But, amid a sad but beautiful panorama of lively characters, love has the final say. Can life be a fairy tale?
Hôtel du Nord

The film consists of a series of tightly interlinked vignettes, the most sustained of which details the story of a man and a woman who are passionately in love. Their attempts to consummate their passion are constantly thwarted, by their families, by the Church and bourgeois society in general.
L'Âge d'or

Married French lawyer Andre defends succesfully the case of Yvette, who committed a robbery. He falls in love with her, but she isn't true to him.
Love Is My Profession

A young girl from the provinces, comes to Paris with one goal: to become a part of the rich bourgeoisie. To achieve this she will use her unique beauty and charm.
Lady of the Camelias

Lyons, France. Michel Descombes is a watchmaker who lives alone with his teenage son Bernard. When the police visit and informs him that Bernard killed a man and is on the run with a girl, Michel realizes that he knew far less about his son than he thought.
The Watchmaker of St. Paul

A collection of sketches that tells the story of prostitution through the ages.
The Oldest Profession

In 1866, a young Muscovite named Alexei Ivanovitch arrives in Baden Baden, then the gambling capital of Austria, and is soon engaged by General Zagorianski to look after his children. Alexei discovers that his employer is a compulsive gambler who has been almost ruined by his addiction. The only money the General has is provided by the Marquis de Grieux, an adventurer who intends to marry Zagorianski’s sister, Pauline. In doing so, de Grieux hopes to profit from the vast inheritance that will come the General’s way from his Aunt Antonina, who is presently very ill. Alexei is appalled by this society which lives only for money. He loves Pauline and wants to take her to a healthier place, but when she refuses to marry him, he begins to gamble at the casino…
The Gambler

Three stories, very different in space and time. Lysistrata, a dancer from ancient times, Jeanne d'Arc, medieval warrior and Elisabeth, American war widow who comes on pilgrimage in Italy.
Daughters of Destiny

A group of travelers, including a monk, stay in a lonely inn in the mountains. The host confesses the monk his habit of serving poisoned soup to the guests, to rob their possessions and to bury them in the backyard. The story unfolds as the monk tries to save the guest's lives without violating the holy secrecy of the confession.
The Red Inn

It's no holds barred for Julian in pursuit of upward mobility. Although expected to channel career aspirations into the Church of the post-Napoleonic era, his intensely romantic liaisons propel him forward at a pace he cannot control.
Le Rouge et le Noir

In France during World War I, Marthe waits for her husband, Jacques, while he fights on the front lines. Marthe then begins a tempestuous affair with 17-year-old François, with whom she had a dalliance before marrying Jacques. Jealous François struggles with the fact that Marthe is married, while she tries to prove her devotion to her young, hotheaded lover. Things become even more complex when Marthe becomes pregnant with Jacques' baby.
Devil in the Flesh

A pathetic police chief, humiliated by everyone around him, suddenly wants a clean slate in life, and resorts to drastic means to achieve it.
Coup de Torchon

A French fugitive arrives in Genoa, where he becomes entangled with an Italian woman and her daughter.
The Walls of Malapaga

Two unlikely companions must smuggle four suitcases filled with contraband pork across Nazi-occupied Paris.