Brigitte Bardot’s five greatest films – ranked
She made her career as a ‘sex kitten’ – but when she got a chance to prove herself, she showed outstanding depth, heart and range
If it weren’t enough that Brigitte Bardot, who has died at the age of 91, was the single greatest sex symbol of the 20th century, she could also sing, very capably, and act, too. The latter point tended to be obscured in the breathless publicity surrounding her: she was arguably more famous for her raunchy photoshoots than any of the films she appeared in.
Except one, perhaps. After spending four years establishing a film career in fluffy French comedies, Bardot was cast by her then-husband Roger Vadim in the provocative And God Created Woman (1956), which caused an international stir and catapulted her to fame. She was the highest-paid actress in France by 1958, and all the most important directors queued up to cast her – the likes of Julien Duvivier, Louis Malle (twice), and, for her two finest performances, Henri-Georges Clouzot and Jean-Luc Godard.
Yet she was frustrated that being typecast stopped her from getting more illustrious roles and she retired for good in 1973, aged 39. When she got a chance to prove herself, Bardot showed remarkable depth, heart and range. Here are five of her greatest performances.
5. Babette Goes to War (1959)
A naïve French country girl in London parachutes into German-occupied France as a seductive Resistance agent, exploiting her resemblance to the girlfriend of a Nazi general. This frothy confection was a big hit in France, and was the first film to prove that Bardot had the acting chops to win over a mainstream audience without disrobing. Columbia Pictures made a big investment in her to fund this. Her husband Roger Vadim was taken off the film when his previous film performed badly and was replaced by journeyman director Christian-Jaque.
Where to watch: available to buy on DVD
4. A Very Private Affair (1962)
A 30-year-old Louis Malle wrote and directed this modish romantic drama, promoted as “The Story of a Star”, and premised on giving audiences a Bardot as close to the “real” one as possible: she plays a young ballerina who becomes an overnight sensation in films. Marcello Mastroianni, red-hot after Fellini’s La dolce Vita (1960) and Antonioni’s La notte (1961), played the older theatre director with whom she becomes embroiled. “A queen, a freak, a goddess,” rhapsodised the trailer. “Yet always lonely.” The irony of the title was quite intentional: Bardot’s image had become the definition of public property by then.
Where to watch: available to buy on DVD
3. And God Created Woman (1956)
And God Created Woman became the most successful foreign-language film in the US up to that time, and cracked the UK top 10 box office in 1957. This was all down to Bardot. She played a rampaging 18-year-old orphan in Saint-Tropez with an almost feral sexuality – “made to destroy men”, as the script puts it. Her persona was carnality incarnate, and the film existed to put her on the map. Compared with the lightly saucy films she’d made before then, this was something of a revolution, because the driving force of the story was her unapologetic hunger for sex. There was uproar Stateside from the Legion of Decency, who had just condemned Elia Kazan’s much tamer Baby Doll (1956). Bardot jubilantly played up to her image.
Where to watch: available to buy on DVD
2. La Vérité (1960)
Henri-Georges Clouzot’s lavish courtroom drama had a huge dramatic role for Bardot: she plays Dominique Marceau, a murder suspect on trial for a crime passionnel after breaking up with her lover (Sami Frey, with whom she began a scandalous on-set affair). It’s quite a showcase, with Bardot proving her mettle in handling Marceau’s tempestuous fickleness and full-bore breakdowns in the dock. It was Oscar-nominated for Best Foreign Film; she deserved, but didn’t get, a Best Actress nomination.
Where to watch: available on YouTube
1. Le Mépris (1963)
Bardot’s cleavage featured heavily on every poster for Jean-Luc Godard’s ravishing opus, but it was the sadness of her performance as Camille, the unsettled wife of Michel Piccoli’s screenwriter-for-hire, that made it special. The long central section, with the bickering couple moving in and out of rooms in their half-furnished flat, was as close as we’ll ever get to seeing Bardot tested dramatically in a play: all the tears, mockery, vituperation and regret are beautifully layered. It’s her most mature work, even if she was still only 29 at the time.
:::::
....
No comments:
Post a Comment