Michel Ciment

Acting

Michel Ciment

Born 1938-05-26 · Paris, France

Michel Ciment (May 26, 1938 - November 13, 2023) was a French film critic and the editor of the cinema magazine Positif. Ciment was a Chevalier of the Order of Merit, Chevalier of the Legion of Honour, Officer in the Order of Arts and Letters, and the former president of FIPRESCI. Ciment participated in the 2012 Sight & Sound critics' poll, where he listed his ten favorite films as follows: 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Earrings of Madame de..., Fellini's Casanova, Persona, Providence, The Rules of the Game, Salvatore Giuliano, Sansho the Bailiff, Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, and Trouble in Paradise. Source: Article "Michel Ciment" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.

Acting credits

Kubrick by Kubrick poster
7.3

American filmmaker Stanley Kubrick (1928–1999), one of the greatest in history, but also one of the most reserved, gave few interviews throughout his long career, and none of them were filmed. A first-person journey through his life and work, based on a recorded conversation with French film critic Michel Climent.

Kubrick by Kubrick

2020

Critic poster
7.9

Seventy critics and filmmakers discuss cinema around the conflict between the artist and the observer, the creator and the critic. Between 1998 and 2007, Kléber Mendonça Filho recorded testimonies about this relationship in Brazil, the United States and Europe, based on his experience as a critic.

Critic

2008

Seduced and Abandoned poster
6.2

SEDUCED AND ABANDONED combines acting legend Alec Baldwin with director James Toback as they lead us on a troublesome and often hilarious journey of raising financing for their next feature film. Moving from director to financier to star actor, the two players provide us with a unique look behind the curtain at the world's biggest and most glamourous film festival, shining a light on the bitter-sweet relationship filmmakers have with Cannes and the film business. Featuring insights from directors Martin Scorsese, 'Bernando Bertolucci' and Roman Polanski; actors Ryan Gosling and Jessica Chastain and a host of film distribution luminaries.

Seduced and Abandoned

2013

Elia Kazan: An Outsider poster
6.8

Hour long documentary on the legendary director.

Elia Kazan: An Outsider

1982

Nicole Kidman: Eyes Wide Open poster
7.6

Nicole Kidman has worked with a host of top directors in a varied career including Gus Van Sant, Jane Campion, Stanley Kubrick, Lars von Trier and Sofia Coppola. A portrait of a fascinatingly ambivalent actress who shines in Hollywood blockbusters as well as auteur cinema, determined to explore, role after role, the female condition.

Nicole Kidman: Eyes Wide Open

2023

Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff poster
6.6

In 2001 Jack Cardiff (1914-2009) became the first director of photography in the history of the Academy Awards to win an Honorary Oscar. But the first time he clasped the famous statuette in his hand was a half-century earlier when his Technicolor camerawork was awarded for Powell and Pressburger's Black Narcissus. Beyond John Huston's The African Queen and King Vidor's War and Peace, the films of the British-Hungarian creative duo (The Red Shoes and A Matter of Life and Death too) guaranteed immortality for the renowned cameraman whose career spanned seventy years.

Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff

2010

Stanley and Us poster
5.3

Three hapless directors arrive in England from Italy to make a documentary on their idol. The funny thing is, they have no interviews lined up! Not to worry, these guys have a miracle or two that they call in.

Stanley and Us

1999

About The Salesman poster
4.2

The Salesman is Asghar Farhadi's seventh film that won two trophies for the Best Actor and Best Screenplay at Cannes Film Festival in 2016 and the academy award for the best Foreign Language Film in 2017. About The Salesman is a documentary about Farhadi's method of filmmaking: development, pre-production, production, and post-production, with interviews with Asghar Farhadi and the analysis of the renowned Iranian and international film critics about The Salesman and Farhadi's cinema.

About The Salesman

2018

Rencontre entre Jerry Schatzberg & Michel Ciment poster
NR

No synopsis available yet.

Rencontre entre Jerry Schatzberg & Michel Ciment

The Sorrow and the Pity: The Film That Shocked France poster
8.0

The story of the documentary The Sorrow and the Pity (1971), directed by Marcel Ophüls, which caused a scandal in a France still traumatized by the German occupation during World War II, because it shattered the myth, cultivated by the followers of President Charles de Gaulle (1890-1970), of a united France that had supposedly stood firm in the face of the ruthless invaders.

The Sorrow and the Pity: The Film That Shocked France

2024

John Boorman : Leçon de cinéma poster
NR

No synopsis available yet.

John Boorman : Leçon de cinéma

2017

Passion and Reason: Michel Ciment on 'Barry Lyndon' poster
NR

French critic and of editor of the film magazine Positif Michel Ciment discusses Stanley Kubrick's films from the 1950s and the evolution of his directing style.

Passion and Reason: Michel Ciment on 'Barry Lyndon'

2017

No artwork available
NR

Director Simoné Laine delves into Ciment’s influential life, including his history with film periodical Positif (and its infamous rivalry with Cahiers du cinéma).

Michel Ciment: The Art of Sharing Movies

2010

No artwork available
NR

A documentary presented by French film critic Michel Ciment, including an interview with Losey's wife Patricia. Covers much of Losey's career with the particular focus on The Criminal.

Joseph Losey and the Criminal

2008

An American Named Kazan poster
6.0

Elia Kazan represented the American dream. An immigrant who came without anything and who became the Prince of Hollywood and Broadway after World War II. Actor, theater director, filmmaker, writer, he is the founder of Actor’s Studio, a collaborator of Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams, and a director who discovered Marlon Brando and James Dean.

An American Named Kazan

2019

Jerry Schatzberg, Portrait Paysage poster
NR

The photographic world of Jerry Schatzberg.

Jerry Schatzberg, Portrait Paysage

2022

No artwork available
7.0

No synopsis available yet.

Le Prédateur et la proie

2017

Portrait of a '60% Perfect Man': Billy Wilder poster
6.9

French film critic Michel Ciment interviews Billy Wilder about his life and filmmaking.

Portrait of a '60% Perfect Man': Billy Wilder

1982

All About Mankiewicz poster
7.0

Joseph L. Mankiewicz discusses his career in a feature-length interview recorded at his New England home and the 1983 Berlin Film Festival.

All About Mankiewicz

1983

The Filmmaker and the Labyrinth poster
9.0

A documentary looking at the life and films of Francesco Rosi.

The Filmmaker and the Labyrinth

2004

Yasujiro Ozu and the Taste of Sake poster
NR

A 1978 episode of the French television program Ciné regards, featuring critics Michel Ciment and Georges Perec, that looks back on Ozu’s career.

Yasujiro Ozu and the Taste of Sake

1978

No artwork available
NR

Michel Ciment talks about Losey’s M.

M présenté par Michel Ciment

2016

Abbas Kiarostami: The Art of Living poster
7.0

Through an interview with Kiarostami in the Aran Islands and interviews with film critics and scholars at Cannes, the director examines Kiarostami's themes and methods. The director also profiles Kiarostami as a poet and a photographer.

Abbas Kiarostami: The Art of Living

2003

A Summer with Joe, Liz and Richard poster
6.0

Shot between Sardinia, Rome, London, Paris, Baltimore and Los Angeles, the film tells of the arrival of Hollywood at Capo Caccia in 1967, when the film "Boom" by Joseph Losey was shot, with the stars Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Although the film, produced with a high budget for the time, aspired to become an international success, it was one of the most sensational flops in the history of cinema.

A Summer with Joe, Liz and Richard

2025

Behind the camera