Jean Renoir

Directing

Jean Renoir

Born 1894-09-15 · Paris, France

Jean Renoir (15 September 1894 – 12 February 1979) was a French film director, screenwriter, actor, producer and author. As a film director and actor, he made more than forty films from the silent era to the end of the 1960s. As an author, he wrote the definitive biography of his father, the painter, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Renoir, My Father (1962). In the 1930s, Renoir was associated with the Popular Front, and several of his films reflect the movement's left-wing politics and deal with social issues as well as class disparities. He was perhaps the most significant director of the poetic realism movement. The satirical comedy-drama film The Rules of the Game (1939) is often cited by critics as among the greatest films ever made; it is the only film to earn a place among the top ten films in the respected British Film Institute's Sight & Sound decennial critics' poll for every decade from the poll's inception in 1952 through the 2012 list. Other important works are Grand Illusion (1937), A Day in the Country (1946) and The River (1951). Andrew Sarris in his influential book of film criticism The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929–1968 included him in the "pantheon" of the 14 greatest film directors who had worked in the United States.

Acting credits

The Rules of the Game poster
7.5

The Marquis de la Chesnaye and his wife host a weekend gala where a variety of complicated romantic and social entanglements between guests and servants lead to tragedy, all against the backdrop of a looming war.

The Rules of the Game

1939

Louis Lumière poster
7.2

Eric Rohmer leads a conversation with Jean Renoir and Henri Langlois on the art of filmmaker Louis Lumière.

Louis Lumière

1968

La Bête Humaine poster
7.1

Returning by train to the French port of Le Havre, Jacques Lantier, a tormented railwayman, meets by chance the impulsive stationmaster Roubard and Séverine, his wife.

La Bête Humaine

1938

Langlois poster
5.3

Documentary portrait of Henri Langlois, co-founder of the Cinémathèque Française.

Langlois

1970

A Day in the Country poster
7.3

The family of a Parisian shop-owner spends a day in the country. The daughter falls in love with a man at the inn, where they spend the day.

A Day in the Country

1946

Quand Jean devint Renoir poster
10.0

The fascinating story of a man destined to be only a son of and who sought all his life to become "someone" by getting rid of the overwhelming image of his genius as a father, the painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

Quand Jean devint Renoir

2017

Backbiters poster
6.8

About the conflict between social classes through the life of the unhappy Catherine Ferrand, an orphan girl, who is a victim of the jealousy of women and the greed of men.

Backbiters

1927

The Emma Bovary Trial poster
6.6

On January 31, 1857, the French writer Gustave Flaubert (1821-80) took his place in the dock for contempt of public morality and religion. The accused, the real one, is, through him, Emma Bovary, heroine with a thousand faces and a thousand desires, guilty without doubt of an unforgivable desire to live.

The Emma Bovary Trial

2021

The Spanish Earth poster
6.7

Joris Ivens’s advocacy documentary for the Republican cause intercuts a besieged Madrid with a nearby village digging an irrigation canal, linking the war to bread, land, and survival. Produced by the writers’ collective Contemporary Historians, edited by Helen van Dongen, scored by Marc Blitzstein, and narrated in its U.S. version by Ernest Hemingway (after an initial Orson Welles track), it blends frontline reportage with persuasion against Franco’s forces and their German–Italian backers.

The Spanish Earth

1937

The Christian Licorice Store poster
4.8

A tennis champ falls in with the Hollywood crowd, finds himself being corrupted by the life in the fast lane.

The Christian Licorice Store

1971

Postface: La Petite Marchande d'allumettes poster
5.0

Jean Renoir talks about the making of La Petite Marchande d'allumettes.

Postface: La Petite Marchande d'allumettes

1969

Jean Renoir: Part One - From La Belle Époque to World War II poster
8.5

Part one of a BBC documentary about Jean Renoir.

Jean Renoir: Part One - From La Belle Époque to World War II

1993

Little Red Riding Hood poster
7.0

This is 1929: the little red riding hood is still with us and her life is more complicated than ever. She still has to go through the forest and she once again comes up against a wolf. This time around the big bad wolf has become a lecherous tramp who keeps stalking the girl trying to wolf her down ... in his own way of course.

Little Red Riding Hood

1930

Life Is Ours poster
6.4

A propaganda film of the communist party of France, showing how the comrades help the proletariat against the capitalists.

Life Is Ours

1936

François Truffaut l'insoumis poster
5.8

This portrait of the world-famous French director based on his personal correspondance reveals the little known insurgent side of his personnality. Featuring interviews with close collaborators, friends and family, this definitive documentary tells his intimate story, from the streets of Paris to the filmmaking accolades and high profile marriages at the height of his career.

François Truffaut l'insoumis

2014

D'un Céline l'autre poster
7.0

Passers-by, those who knew him in his youth, René Barjavel, witness of his beginnings, his wife, his doctor, writers ... By questioning them Michel Polac tries to better understand the troubled personality of Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Notorious anti-Semite and genius writer.

D'un Céline l'autre

1969

La P’tite Lili poster
5.1

La P’tite Lili is a silent short drama depicting the fate of a young orphaned girl in the working-class districts of Paris. The film follows Lili, a teenage girl marked by innocence and vulnerability, as she is drawn into the city’s underworld after encountering a man who exploits her circumstances. Told through impressionistic visual style rather than dialogue, the film presents a tragic portrait of social marginalization and moral collapse within an urban environment.

La P’tite Lili

1927

Cinéastes de notre temps : Erich von Stroheim poster
5.0

No synopsis available yet.

Cinéastes de notre temps : Erich von Stroheim

2012

Directing Actors by Jean Renoir poster
7.0

A example of Jean Renoir's talents as a director as he works Gisèle Braunberger into the right frame of mind.

Directing Actors by Jean Renoir

1969

No artwork available
NR

This analysis is based on an ideological commentary on Renoir's film. From the beginning, the reading, unilateral, gives keys to interpret the characters: "These are shadows returning to the castle". Renoir "paints the lie of a society that no longer believes in its own values".

La règle du jeu de Jean Renoir: Une analyse du film par l'image

1987

Jean Renoir parle de son art poster
NR

Three-part interview with French film director Jean Renoir, conducted by French New Wave director Jacques Rivette.

Jean Renoir parle de son art

1961

The Little Theatre of Jean Renoir poster
6.8

Three vignettes and a musical interlude showcase acclaimed auteur Jean Renoir's eclectic range at the end of his career: the relationship between an old man and an old woman, both homeless; an opera-like story of a woman obsessed with polishing her floors; Jeanne Moreau performs 'When Love Dies'; and an elderly man and his young wife coming to terms when she has an affair with a man her own age.

The Little Theatre of Jean Renoir

1974

Le Parti du cinéma poster
7.7

No synopsis available yet.

Le Parti du cinéma

2021

Charleston Parade poster
6.0

Shot in three days, this surreal, erotic silent short shows a native white girl teaching a futuristic African airman the Charleston dance.

Charleston Parade

1927

Behind the camera

The River poster
7.2

Director Jean Renoir’s entrancing first color feature—shot entirely on location in India—is a visual tour de force. Based on the novel by Rumer Godden, the film eloquently contrasts the growing pains of three young women with the immutability of the Bengal river around which their daily lives unfold. Enriched by Renoir’s subtle understanding and appreciation for India and its people, The River gracefully explores the fragile connections between transitory emotions and everlasting creation.

The River

1951

The River poster
7.2

Director Jean Renoir’s entrancing first color feature—shot entirely on location in India—is a visual tour de force. Based on the novel by Rumer Godden, the film eloquently contrasts the growing pains of three young women with the immutability of the Bengal river around which their daily lives unfold. Enriched by Renoir’s subtle understanding and appreciation for India and its people, The River gracefully explores the fragile connections between transitory emotions and everlasting creation.

The River

1951

The River poster
7.2

Director Jean Renoir’s entrancing first color feature—shot entirely on location in India—is a visual tour de force. Based on the novel by Rumer Godden, the film eloquently contrasts the growing pains of three young women with the immutability of the Bengal river around which their daily lives unfold. Enriched by Renoir’s subtle understanding and appreciation for India and its people, The River gracefully explores the fragile connections between transitory emotions and everlasting creation.

The River

1951

The Rules of the Game poster
7.5

The Marquis de la Chesnaye and his wife host a weekend gala where a variety of complicated romantic and social entanglements between guests and servants lead to tragedy, all against the backdrop of a looming war.

The Rules of the Game

1939

The Rules of the Game poster
7.5

The Marquis de la Chesnaye and his wife host a weekend gala where a variety of complicated romantic and social entanglements between guests and servants lead to tragedy, all against the backdrop of a looming war.

The Rules of the Game

1939

The Rules of the Game poster
7.5

The Marquis de la Chesnaye and his wife host a weekend gala where a variety of complicated romantic and social entanglements between guests and servants lead to tragedy, all against the backdrop of a looming war.

The Rules of the Game

1939

Grand Illusion poster
7.9

A group of French soldiers, including the patrician Captain de Boeldieu and the working-class Lieutenant Maréchal, grapple with their own class differences after being captured and held in a World War I German prison camp. When the men are transferred to a high-security fortress, they must concoct a plan to escape beneath the watchful eye of aristocratic German officer von Rauffenstein, who has formed an unexpected bond with de Boeldieu.

Grand Illusion

1937

Grand Illusion poster
7.9

A group of French soldiers, including the patrician Captain de Boeldieu and the working-class Lieutenant Maréchal, grapple with their own class differences after being captured and held in a World War I German prison camp. When the men are transferred to a high-security fortress, they must concoct a plan to escape beneath the watchful eye of aristocratic German officer von Rauffenstein, who has formed an unexpected bond with de Boeldieu.

Grand Illusion

1937

The Tournament poster
4.7

Rival knights compete for the hand of a beautiful maiden in this period feature from Jean Renoir.

The Tournament

1928

The Elusive Corporal poster
6.4

An upper-class corporal is captured by the Germans during their 1940 invasion of France. Assisted and accompanied by characters as diverse as a morose dairy farmer, a waiter, a myopic intellectual, a working-class Parisian, and a German dental assistant, the corporal tries to escape from prison camps, sometimes making it a few yards, sometimes reaching the border.

The Elusive Corporal

1962

The Elusive Corporal poster
6.4

An upper-class corporal is captured by the Germans during their 1940 invasion of France. Assisted and accompanied by characters as diverse as a morose dairy farmer, a waiter, a myopic intellectual, a working-class Parisian, and a German dental assistant, the corporal tries to escape from prison camps, sometimes making it a few yards, sometimes reaching the border.

The Elusive Corporal

1962

French Cancan poster
7.2

Nineteenth-century Paris comes vibrantly alive in Jean Renoir’s exhilarating tale of the opening of the world-renowned Moulin Rouge. Jean Gabin plays the wily impresario Danglard, who makes the cancan all the rage while juggling the love of two beautiful women—an Egyptian belly-dancer and a naive working girl turned cancan star.

French Cancan

1955

French Cancan poster
7.2

Nineteenth-century Paris comes vibrantly alive in Jean Renoir’s exhilarating tale of the opening of the world-renowned Moulin Rouge. Jean Gabin plays the wily impresario Danglard, who makes the cancan all the rage while juggling the love of two beautiful women—an Egyptian belly-dancer and a naive working girl turned cancan star.

French Cancan

1955

La Bête Humaine poster
7.1

Returning by train to the French port of Le Havre, Jacques Lantier, a tormented railwayman, meets by chance the impulsive stationmaster Roubard and Séverine, his wife.

La Bête Humaine

1938

La Bête Humaine poster
7.1

Returning by train to the French port of Le Havre, Jacques Lantier, a tormented railwayman, meets by chance the impulsive stationmaster Roubard and Séverine, his wife.

La Bête Humaine

1938

Nana poster
6.7

Count Moffat becomes infatuated with Nana, a presumptuous stage actress, vulgar, hypocritical and promiscuous, willing to do anything to succeed.

Nana

1926

Nana poster
6.7

Count Moffat becomes infatuated with Nana, a presumptuous stage actress, vulgar, hypocritical and promiscuous, willing to do anything to succeed.

Nana

1926

Le Bled poster
5.9

A young French woman inherits her uncle's property in Algeria, and finds herself plotted against by her envious cousins, but also romanced by a handsome but previously irresponsible young man from a neighbouring farm.

Le Bled

1929

A Day in the Country poster
7.3

The family of a Parisian shop-owner spends a day in the country. The daughter falls in love with a man at the inn, where they spend the day.

A Day in the Country

1946

A Day in the Country poster
7.3

The family of a Parisian shop-owner spends a day in the country. The daughter falls in love with a man at the inn, where they spend the day.

A Day in the Country

1946

The Woman on the Beach poster
6.1

A sailor suffering from post-traumatic stress becomes involved with a beautiful and enigmatic seductress married to a blind painter.

The Woman on the Beach

1947

The Woman on the Beach poster
6.1

A sailor suffering from post-traumatic stress becomes involved with a beautiful and enigmatic seductress married to a blind painter.

The Woman on the Beach

1947

Experiment in Evil poster
6.7

Dr. Cordelier, living in a suburb of Paris, withdraws from society to pursue research into the functioning of the human brain. His lifelong friend, Maître Joly, becomes concerned when Cordelier draws up a will that bequeaths his entire estate to a stranger, Monsieur Opale; he cannot understand why Cordelier defends him, considering Opale attacks women and children. After a colleague is killed, Joly confronts Cordelier and discovers the truth behind his friend's behavior.

Experiment in Evil

1960

Experiment in Evil poster
6.7

Dr. Cordelier, living in a suburb of Paris, withdraws from society to pursue research into the functioning of the human brain. His lifelong friend, Maître Joly, becomes concerned when Cordelier draws up a will that bequeaths his entire estate to a stranger, Monsieur Opale; he cannot understand why Cordelier defends him, considering Opale attacks women and children. After a colleague is killed, Joly confronts Cordelier and discovers the truth behind his friend's behavior.

Experiment in Evil

1960