La mariée était en noir
- 1968
- Tous publics
- 1h 47min
La mère de Julie Kohler l'empêche de se suicider. Julie quitte la ville. Elle va traquer, charmer et tuer cinq hommes qui ne la connaissent pas. Quel est son but? Quel est son objectif?La mère de Julie Kohler l'empêche de se suicider. Julie quitte la ville. Elle va traquer, charmer et tuer cinq hommes qui ne la connaissent pas. Quel est son but? Quel est son objectif?La mère de Julie Kohler l'empêche de se suicider. Julie quitte la ville. Elle va traquer, charmer et tuer cinq hommes qui ne la connaissent pas. Quel est son but? Quel est son objectif?
- Réalisation
- Scénario
- Casting principal
- Récompenses
- 1 victoire et 5 nominations au total
- Rene Morane
- (as Michel Lonsdale)
- Le juge d'instruction
- (as Gilles Queant)
- Le policier
- (non crédité)
Avis à la une
We see the murder of the husband repeatedly throughout the picture, studied from different angles and vantage points. He is assassinated on the steps of the church, while the thunderous 'wedding suite' plays rather ominously. We find out why she picks her victims the way she does and how they all relate to the slaying. This is one ticked off woman. Some of the murders echoed Hitch, one inspired by FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT, another from NOTORIOUS. The scenes and "borrowing" that occur here are not as blatant as you may think, however. They are mostly inspirations and Truffaut puts his own spin on them, meshing them together or taking them apart and reassembling the elements. If you are a Hitch connoisseur, it is fun to interpret what Truffaut is doing with the master's vast material.
I was also struck by a feeling of NORTH BY NORTHWEST, but with a woman as the main protagonist and the journey turned inside out. Of course, we get the character who has seen this person before and either leads to her capture or is on to her, a staple in Hitch flix. The ultimate homage is Bernard Herrmann's score (he was Hitch's right hand man for years). The 'wedding suite' is louder than usual, resonating evil, and the music as a whole is Herrmann's typical gothic work, brilliant and memorable. Truffaut extends Hitchcock by showing us in more graphic detail some of the killings and the relentless mission this woman is on is not stylized the least bit.
Check out the poisoning scene and tell me you don't see Ingrid Bergman looking at Claude Raines circling and bellowing in expressionistic ways. Trains are littered throughout the film, one on the lampshade of a young boy, another with Moreau riding on it. This is all great, but it transcends some of Hitch's work in many ways. The blood-curdling ending is one of the best I have ever seen in film, period. Considering BRIDE WORE BLACK was released in 1968, the horrific ending may have inspired HITCH of all people when he made FRENZY in 1972. Watch both and see if you know what I mean. This is a must see for foreign film fans as well.
RATING: 8 1/2 of 10
Jeanne Moreau is always outstanding!
I was genuinely quite surprised by the use of humour here. I expected from the plot-outline that the film would be incredibly dour and austere but that really isn't the case; with the mixture of lurid, almost B-movie style subject matter, revenge and farce managing to come together fairly well for the most part, as Truffaut tinkers with the expected codes and conventions of the thriller genre in much the same way that Antonioni did with the much superior masterpiece Blowup (1966). Like Blowup, the film can be seen as something of an "anti-thriller", or a film that sets up a number of potentially electrifying Hitchcockian like set pieces and then continually thwarts them - or indeed, forgets about them completely - as the mechanics of the plot push us further and further away from the more recognisable aspects of the story at hand. Whenever we imagine that a scene will play out to our usual expectations, with Hermann's orchestrations and the inventive camera work of Godard's regular cinematographer Raoul Coutard setting the scene, something else happens that throws the film completely off course. For example, in one particular scene, in which our central character stalks one of her victims through the junkyard where he works, we get Truffaut setting up a series of shots that continually teases us with the slow-build of the sequence, the cut-away to the gun and the impending moment before the expected gunshot and then - unexpectedly - the police arrive and arrest the man before any retribution can be taken.
This idea of setting up something potentially very thrilling and exciting, only to then subvert it by way of knowing farce and arch genre references is used throughout The Bride Wore Black, creating an odd juxtaposition between light comedy and cold-blooded murder that probably won't be to all tastes. Apparently the critics of the time hated it, and indeed, Truffaut himself would denounce the film as one of his worst just a few years later, perhaps as a reaction to the knowing tone and the flippant games being played with the more recognisable cinematic conventions. Obviously, Truffaut was a huge fan of Hitchcock, and indeed, one of the first critics to really look at his films within a serious historical context, but all the same, the satirical sideswipes at Hitchcock's work and the evidence of homage is often quite cutting and not always as complimentary as we might expect. The final shot for example, which is indeed very clever and filled with ideas of visual wit, is at the same time blunt to the point of almost going out of its way to lampoon the ending of some of Hitchcock's earlier films like Saboteur (1942). Then we have the ultimate revelation of the event that drove the character to seek revenge and the almost broadly comical rendering of the scene and the complete disregard for any kind of logic and reason.
Was the reason that Truffaut denounced the film simply because he felt it was uncomplimentary, almost mocking of Hitchcock's work, or did he simply feel that the games within the narrative and the combination of murder and farce were simply unsuccessful on this particular project? Regardless, the film succeeds on an entirely perverse level, as we watch Jeanne Moreau step into the role of the iconic "Hitchcock blonde" and plot bloody revenge on those that have wronged her. Some have drawn comparisons with Tarantino's epic Kill Bill (2003-2004), which are apt given the basic outline of the plot and certain elements of the iconography, though Tarantino claims to be unfamiliar with the film in question. Although the broader ramifications of the narrative remain vague and enigmatic even through to the end, the fun of The Bride Wore Black is not in its characters or storytelling capabilities, but in the gleeful subversion of the iconography of the Hollywood thriller by way of the Nouvelle Vague and of course, those constant allusions to Hitchcock and his work.
Resume:
First watch: 2018 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 8
"La Mariée Était en Noir" is a simple but excellent thriller. The geniality of François Truffault develops the tragedy of the lead character Julie Kohler with only few flashbacks. Jeanne Moreau is amazing, in the role of a woman that sees her world falling apart with the stupid murder of her beloved husband, and is driven by revenge to stay alive. The conclusion with the camera focusing the security guard is fantastic. The famous "cross of legs" of Catherine Tramell in "Basic Instinct" was probably inspired in the shy one of Julie Kohler in the police department. "The Bride" of "Kill Bill" is also inspired in this classic French movie. My vote is eight.
Title (Brazil): "A Noiva Estava de Preto" ("The Bride Was In Black")
Note: on 06 December 2010, I saw this film again on DVD.
Le saviez-vous
- AnecdotesThis film is François Truffaut's homage to Alfred Hitchcock, made shortly after Truffaut had published a book of extensive interviews with Hitchcock. As part of his homage, Truffaut chose a novel written by Cornell Woolrich, on whose story Hitchcock's Fenêtre sur cour (1954) was based, and even chose long-time Hitchcock collaborator Bernard Herrmann to compose the score.
- GaffesWhen Coral shows his ticket at the theater, he is told that the performance had started three minutes ago, and is immediately shown to his box. When he gets inside the theater, the performers are in the middle of the second movement of the piece (Ludwig van Beethoven's Cello Sonata #3), implying that they had been playing for at least 10 minutes.
- Citations
Coral: Permit me to make an impossible wish?
Julie Kohler: Why impossible?
Coral: Because I'm a rather pessimist.
Julie Kohler: I've heard it said: "There are no optimists or pessimists. There are only happy idiots or unhappy ones".
Coral: [smiling] Yes, well. I'm an unhappy idiot then.
- ConnexionsFeatured in Introduction to Truffaut Season (1972)
Meilleurs choix
- How long is The Bride Wore Black?Alimenté par Alexa
Détails
- Date de sortie
- Pays d’origine
- Langue
- Aussi connu sous le nom de
- La novia vestía de negro
- Lieux de tournage
- Eglise Saint-Lambert de Vaugirard, Paris 15, Paris, France(wedding church)
- Sociétés de production
- Voir plus de crédits d'entreprise sur IMDbPro
Box-office
- Budget
- 747 000 $US (estimé)
- Montant brut aux États-Unis et au Canada
- 45 075 $US
- Week-end de sortie aux États-Unis et au Canada
- 11 206 $US
- 25 avr. 1999
- Montant brut mondial
- 45 263 $US
- Durée1 heure 47 minutes
- Mixage
- Rapport de forme
- 1.66 : 1