Pisier, Marie-France 1944-

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PISIER, Marie-France 1944-

PERSONAL: Born May 10, 1944, in Dalat, Indochina (now Vietnam); father, a French government official.

ADDRESSES: Agent—Laurent Gregoire, Intertalent, 5 rue Clement-Marot, 75008 Paris, France.

CAREER: Actress, director, and writer. Film appearances include Qui ose nous accuser?, 1961; Les Saintes nitouches, 1962; "Antoine et Colette," L'Amour a vingt ans, 1962, released in the United States by Embassy, 1963; La Morte d'un tueur, 1963; Les Yeux cernes, 1964; Le Vampire de Duesseldorf, 1965; L'Ecume des jours, 1967; Non sta bene rubare il tesoro, 1967; Trans-Europ-Express, Trans American, 1968; Baisers voles, Lopert, 1969; Paulina s'en va, 1969; Le Journal d'un suicide, 1972; Feminin-Feminin, 1973; Celine et Julie vont en bateau, Les Films Christian Fachner, 1974; Le Fantome de la liberte, 1974; Souvenirs d'en France, AMLF, 1975; Barocco, Films la Boetie, 1976; Serail, Contemporary, 1976; Cousin, Cousine, Les Films Pomerey/Gaumont, 1976; Le Corps e mon ennemi, AMLF, 1976; The Other Side of Midnight, Twentieth Century-Fox, 1977; Les Apprentis sorciers, Backstreet/Institut National de L'Audiovisuel/Buffalo, 1977; Les Soeurs Brontë, Gaumont, 1979; French Postcards, Paramount, 1979; La Banquiere, Gaumont, 1980; L'Amour en fuite, Les Films du Carosse, 1980; Miss Right, IAP/Sony Video Software, 1981; Chanel Solitaire, United Film Distribution, 1981; L'As des as, Gaumont, 1982; Hot Touch, Astral/Trans-Atlantic Enterprises, 1982; Der Zauberberg, Franz Seitz Filmproduktion/Gaumont/Opera Film Produzione/Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen, 1982; Boulevard des assassins, 1982; AMLF/World Marketing, 1983; Le Prix du danger, Brent Walker Film Distributors/Union Generale Cinematographique, 1983; Union Generale Cinematographique, 1984; 44 ou les recits de la nuit, 1985; Parking, A.M., 1985; L'Inconnu de Vienne, SFP, 1986; L'Oeuvre au noir, Union Generale Cinematographique/Twentieth Century-Fox, 1988; La Note bleue, 1991; Francois Truffaut: Portraits voles, 1993; Pourquoi maman est dans mon lit?, 1994; Tous les jours dimanche, 1995; Le Fils de Gascogne, 1995; La Gazelle, 1996; Marion, 1997; Pourquoi pas moi?, Cinema Mondo, 1999; La Patinoire, Interama Video, 1999; Le Temps retrouve, Kino International, 1990; Sur un air d'autoroute, United International Pictures, 2000; Combat d'amour en songe, Gemini Films, 2000; Inch'Allah dimanche, 2001; and Comme un avion, 2002.

Appearances on television miniseries include The French Atlantic Affair, ABC, 1979; Scruples, CBS, 1980; and Les Marmottes, 1998. Appearances on episodic television include "Le Fetichiste," Temoignages. Other television appearances include Les Gens de mogador, 1972; Der Stille Ozean, 1982; Une Maman dans la ville, 1992; La Verite est un vilain defaut, 1995; Notre homme, 1995; Une femme sur mesure, 1997; Un jeune Francais, 2000; and La Couleur du mensonge, 2001. Television work as director includes Le Bal du gouverneur, 1990.

AWARDS, HONORS: Cesar Award for Best Supporting Actress, 1976, for Cousin, cousine, 1977, for Barocco.

WRITINGS:

(With Jacques Rivette, Eduardo du Gregorio, Juliet Berto, Dominique LaBourier, and Bulle Ogier) Celine et Julie Vont en bateau (screenplay, also known as Celine and Julie Go Boating and Phantom Ladies over Paris), Les Films Christian Fachner, 1974.

(With François Truffaut, Jean Aurel, and Suzanne Schiffman) L'Amour en fuite (screenplay, also known as Love on the Run), Les Films du Carosse, 1980.

Le Bal du gouverneur (screenplay, also known as TheGovernor's Party; based on her novel by the same name—see below) France 3 Cinema, 1990. Comme un avion (screenplay, also known as Like an

Airplane), Rezo Films, 2002.

NOVELS

Le bal du gouverneur, Bernard Grasset (Paris, France), 1984.

Je n'ai aime que vous, Bernard Grasset (Paris, France), 1986.

Le deuil du printemps, Bernard Grasset (Paris, France), 1997.

SIDELIGHTS: Referring to the director with whom Marie-France Pisier shared screenwriting credit for Celine and Julie Go Boating, Royal S. Brown in Cineaste wrote that "Of the various French directors that one can place within that loosely defined group known as The New Wave, Jacques Rivette is certainly one of the least well-known in the United States." Brown went on to note that while others such as François Truffaut were gaining mainstream acceptance, Rivette "remained the true independent, if not totally underground, filmmaker." It is certainly hard, when reading Brown's summary of the film's "plot," to find evidence suggesting that the film—which he judged as Rivette's masterpiece—would be likely to find acceptance with any popular audience, particularly in the United States. For instance, Brown described the characters played by Pisier, Bulle Ogler, and Barbet Schroeder as ghoulish figures who live "within the foreboding confines of a large, shuttered brick mansion set beneath the level of a street improbably named the Rue du Nadir des Pommes (Apples' Nadir Street).... Like refugees from a Pirandello play, they find themselves trapped in a double narrative taken from two different works by Henry James."

By contrast, Pisier's own Like an Airplane, which she wrote and directed a quarter century after her work with Rivette, seems straightforward if a bit complex. In the story, a doctoral candidate named Lola has a tempestuous relationship with a lawyer, Simon, while her little brother Guillaume develops a crush on a girl in his high-school class. Meanwhile, their mother, Claire (played by Pisier herself), pretends to go on vacation so that she can secretly recuperate from a double mastectomy. Somewhat less complicated, if only slightly, is 1979's Love on the Run, directed by Truffaut, which concerns a proofreader named Antoine. Having divorced his wife, he meets Colette (Pisier), the girl he loved as a teenager, who has just purchased a copy of an autobiographical novel he has recently published. Still, there are more complications, since Antoine is already in love with a third woman, a record-seller named Sabine.