Writing

Roland Topor

Born 1938-01-07 · Paris, France

Roland Topor was a French illustrator, cartoonist, comics artist, painter, novelist, playwright, film and TV writer, filmmaker and actor, known for the surreal nature of his work. He gained notoriety as one of the home cartoonists of the subversive French magazine Hara-Kiri, renamed later Charlie-Hebdo. Roland Topor wrote the novel The Tenant (Le Locataire chimérique, 1964), which was adapted to film by Roman Polanski in 1976. The Tenant is the story of a Parisian of Polish descent, a chilling exploration of alienation and identity, asking disturbing questions about how we define ourselves.

Acting credits

Nosferatu the Vampyre poster
7.3

A real estate agent leaves behind his beautiful wife to go to Transylvania to visit the mysterious Count Dracula and formalize the purchase of a property in Wismar.

Nosferatu the Vampyre

1979

Sweet Movie poster
5.3

The winner of the Miss World Virginity contest marries, escapes from her masochistic husband and ends up involved in a world of debauchery.

Sweet Movie

1974

The Satin Spider poster
2.8

The setting is Les Fauvettes School for Girls just after WWI, where sternly Teutonic headmistress Ingrid Caven vies with Catherine Jourdan, a morphine addicted, fabric fetishist gym teacher, for the sexual favours of liquid eyed nymphet Scyluna. Meanwhile the chaplain conducts a nude exorcism.

The Satin Spider

1986

Swann in Love poster
5.6

In Belle Époque Paris, a 19th-century Parisian aristocrat falls in love with a lower-class prostitute who seduces him but never loves him.

Swann in Love

1984

Destins parallèles poster
9.0

No synopsis available yet.

Destins parallèles

1979

Cartoon circus poster
6.7

Feature film.

Cartoon circus

1972

Who Are You, Polly Maggoo? poster
6.5

A model tells a television crew about her dreams of a life with prince charming all while fending off the lecherous advances of a horde of men.

Who Are You, Polly Maggoo?

1966

The Making of 'Nosferatu' poster
6.3

Werner Herzog discusses the making of "Nosferatu" on set.

The Making of 'Nosferatu'

1979

Three Lives and Only One Death poster
6.5

Four intertwining stories of bizarre occurrences in Paris featuring a man who was stolen away by fairies, a professor who becomes a tramp, the lovers who inherit a chateau – and the last tale that connects all that has gone before.

Three Lives and Only One Death

1996

Fantastic Laloux poster
5.1

A short documentary about the life of director and artist René Laloux, featuring an interview with Laloux from 2001.

Fantastic Laloux

2010

Ratataplan poster
6.9

Misadventures of Colombo, an engineer in Milano. He is the only winner of an admission test for a job, and just for this reason he isn't hired. So he becomes a barman, and he discovers a special formula that turns simple water into the "Immortality drink". He is robbed of the magic water copyright. So he tries to set up a theatrical company, but the first show is a fiasco. Since finding a normal job seems a mission impossible, he tries to set the sentimental side of his life. He targets the most beautiful girl of his building, and for her he builds a robot able to dance like Tony Manero (John Travolta's character in Saturday Night Fever (1977)). The robot gets drunk (!). It is another fiasco. So he targets an ugly girl and finally with her succeeds to live his surreal world for ever.

Ratataplan

1979

Les vendredis d'Apostrophes poster
6.0

Hours and historical meetings, Pierre Assouline has composed an anthology of the best extracts presented in the form of a primer, which he had commented on by a surprised Bernard Pivot.

Les vendredis d'Apostrophes

2015

The Daughter of the Railroad Crossing Guard poster
10.0

Based on the idea by Roland Topor (screenwriter of Roman Polanski's The Tenant), this very curious completely silent melodrama tells the story of Mona, who has left her father, the railway gatekeeper, after being raped on the train track. She is kidnapped and taken to a Parisian whorehouse. However, a disinherited prince, Dudu who tries to rescue her, is himself kidnapped and forced to serve as a male prostitute. The two captives meet there and fall in love. They are taken away by different rich people - he to an Arab "harem," she to a surgeon's home.

The Daughter of the Railroad Crossing Guard

1975

Threshold of the Void poster
7.2

The young artist Wanda Leibovitz comes to Paris, hoping to forget unfortunate love. Soon after arrival directly at the station Wanda meets the mysterious old woman suggesting to rent at it the room (whom the old woman, allegedly, held ready for the now deceased sister). Wanda doesn't know yet that this room will change all her life shortly after it slightly opens a mysterious forbidden door.

Threshold of the Void

1974

Italiques: Roland Topor poster
NR

Roger Boussinot directed this episode of the French television show Italiques, which features an overview of the art and career of Fantastic Planet illustrator Roland Topor. It aired on August 8, 1974.

Italiques: Roland Topor

1974

The Ones That Got Away poster
4.8

In a train compartment, 6 people who do not know each other tell the story of their troubles in love. Only one of those seems to be a positive one.

The Ones That Got Away

1981

Topor and Me poster
7.0

Animated short by actress Sylvia Kristel about the art scene in Paris during the start of her French career playing Emmanuelle. She reminisces about Roland Topor, who taught her to paint, Hugo Claus, W.F. Hermans and others, while their respective work comes to life in animation.

Topor and Me

2004

No artwork available
NR

A brief meeting with the writer and playwright Roland Topor in his studio.

Le Cinéma au travail comme la mort

1997

He! Viva Dada poster
NR

Report from the second free expression festival organized at the American Cultural Center, Boulevard Raspail, in May 1965. The shows, all happenings inspired by ""théâtre panique/ the panic theater", includes Fernando Arrabal, Roland Topor and Alejandro Jodorowsky.

He! Viva Dada

1965

The Butcher, the Star and the Orphan poster
5.0

A butcher dreams of becoming a famous director. He hires stars that he begins to kill.

The Butcher, the Star and the Orphan

1975

Topor, Père et Fils poster
NR

No synopsis available yet.

Topor, Père et Fils

1993

Comment devenir cinéaste sans se prendre la tête poster
8.0

No synopsis available yet.

Comment devenir cinéaste sans se prendre la tête

1995

Behind the camera

Fantastic Planet poster
7.6

On the planet Ygam, the Draags, extremely technologically and spiritually advanced blue humanoids, consider the tiny Oms, human beings descendants of Terra's inhabitants, as ignorant animals. Those who live in slavery are treated as simple pets and used to entertain Draag children; those who live hidden in the hostile wilderness of the planet are periodically hunted and ruthlessly slaughtered as if they were vermin.

Fantastic Planet

1973

Marquis poster
6.5

On the eve of revolution, French activist and author Marquis and his talking penis, Colin, await judgment in the Bastille for allegedly plotting against the state. While Marquis dedicates himself to his art and Colin longs for action, the provocative pair unwittingly rouse the interest of competing ideological factions.

Marquis

1989

La Galette du roi poster
4.5

In this conventional, broadly comic farce of greed and royal matrimony, nearly bankrupt businessman Victor Harris is marrying Maria-Helena, a princess who comes with a dowry that is made up of one half of her island kingdom. Her father, the cowardly King Arnold III is counting on the money this marriage will bring him. The country is now almost bankrupt because of the king's gambling debts. As Harris and the king look forward to their illusory profits from the royal merger, other characters add some liveliness to the otherwise predictable story.

La Galette du roi

1986

The Troubles of Alfred poster
5.9

Unlucky in love, Alfred tries to commit suicide, only to be thwarted by police efforts to prevent a simultaneous attempt by a nearby young woman. Recovering, the young lady puts him up at her house, as he has run out of places to live. He joins a Parisian sporting team and seems to have transferred his bad luck to a corrupt television boss who is attempting to manipulate the game so that Alfred's Paris team loses.

The Troubles of Alfred

1972

The Snails poster
6.9

In a distant planetoid, an industrious but hapless old farmer strives to make his vegetables flourish, however, to no avail.

The Snails

1966

Dead Times poster
7.1

What is man? Man makes war, man kills man, man hunts, man is executed. A montage mixing original drawings by Topor, original shots and stock shots that ironically analyze what man is.

Dead Times

1964

No artwork available
7.0

No synopsis available yet.

The Game

1975

The Daughter of the Railroad Crossing Guard poster
10.0

Based on the idea by Roland Topor (screenwriter of Roman Polanski's The Tenant), this very curious completely silent melodrama tells the story of Mona, who has left her father, the railway gatekeeper, after being raped on the train track. She is kidnapped and taken to a Parisian whorehouse. However, a disinherited prince, Dudu who tries to rescue her, is himself kidnapped and forced to serve as a male prostitute. The two captives meet there and fall in love. They are taken away by different rich people - he to an Arab "harem," she to a surgeon's home.

The Daughter of the Railroad Crossing Guard

1975

The Hamburg Syndrome poster
5.6

When a plague breaks out in Hamburg, several people break out of quarantine and make their way out of the city... only to find that the plague is more widespread.

The Hamburg Syndrome

1979

He! Viva Dada poster
NR

Report from the second free expression festival organized at the American Cultural Center, Boulevard Raspail, in May 1965. The shows, all happenings inspired by ""théâtre panique/ the panic theater", includes Fernando Arrabal, Roland Topor and Alejandro Jodorowsky.

He! Viva Dada

1965

The Butcher, the Star and the Orphan poster
5.0

A butcher dreams of becoming a famous director. He hires stars that he begins to kill.

The Butcher, the Star and the Orphan

1975