Claire Denis

Director

April 21, 1946 (80 years)

Paris, France

Biography

Claire Denis (/dəˈniː/; French: [dəni]; born 21 April 1946) is a French film director and screenwriter. Her feature film Beau Travail (1999) has been called one of the greatest films of the 1990s and of all time. Her work has dealt with themes of colonial and post-colonial West Africa, as well as issues in modern France, and continues to influence European cinematic identity. Other acclaimed works include Trouble Every Day (2001), 35 Shots of Rum (2008), White Material (2009), High Life (2018) …

Filmography

8.1

Paris, Texas

A man wanders out of the desert not knowing who he is. His brother finds him, and helps to pull his memory back of the life he led before he walked out on his family and disappeared four years earlier.

7.5

The Old Gun

In Montauban in 1944, Julien Dandieu is a surgeon in the local hospital. Frightened by the German army entering Montauban, he asks his friend Francois to drive his wife and his daughter in the back country village where Julien has an old castle. One week later, Julien decides to meet them for the week end, but the Germans are already occupying the village.

7.8

Wings of Desire

Two angels, Damiel and Cassiel, glide through the streets of Berlin, observing the bustling population, providing invisible rays of hope to the distressed but never interacting with them. When Damiel falls in love with lonely trapeze artist Marion, the angel longs to experience life in the physical world, and finds — with some words of wisdom from actor Peter Falk — that it might be possible for him to take human form.

5.7

High Life

Monte and his daughter are the last survivors of a damned and dangerous mission to deep space. The crew—death-row inmates led by a doctor with sinister motives—has vanished. As the mystery of what happened onboard the ship is unraveled, father and daughter must rely on each other to survive as they hurtle toward the oblivion of a black hole.

7.1

Beau Travail

Foreign Legion officer Galoup recalls his once glorious life, training troops in the Gulf of Djibouti. His existence there was happy, strict and regimented, until the arrival of a promising young recruit, Sentain, plants the seeds of jealousy in Galoup's mind.

5.3

Sweet Movie

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

5.6

The Fence

A vast public works project in West Africa. Horn, the construction site manager, and Cal, a young engineer, share lodging behind the double gates of their compound. Leone, Horn’s recent bride, comes to join them the same night that a man appears at the fence. His name is Alboury. Like a specter in the darkness, he demands the body of his brother who died earlier that day on the site. He will hound the two men all night long until they return it, as Leone watches the disaster play out before her.

5.8

Stars at Noon

In present-day Nicaragua, a headstrong American journalist and a mysterious English businessman strike up a romance as they become embroiled in a dangerous labyrinth of lies and conspiracies and are forced to try and escape the country.

7.3

Down by Law

A disc jockey, a pimp and an Italian tourist escape from jail in New Orleans.

5.8

Trouble Every Day

Newlyweds Shane and June arrive in Paris for their honeymoon. In the process of trying to find a cure for his strange, bloodthirsty disease, Shane stumbles upon the story of a doctor and his flesh eating wife.

5.1

Venice 70: Future Reloaded

Made for the Venice Film Festival's 70th anniversary, seventy filmmakers made a short film between 60 and 90 seconds long on their interpretation of the future of cinema.

6.1

Friday Night

The night before she is to move in with her boyfriend, a young Parisian woman picks up a male hitchhiker, leading to a highly charged and impossibly erotic detour.

5.6

Both Sides of the Blade

Jean and Sara have been living together for 10 years. When they first met, Sara was living with François, Jean’s best friend and an admirer from back when he played rugby. Jean and Sara love each other. One day, Sara sees François in the street. He does not notice her, but she is overtaken by the sensation that her life could suddenly change. François gets back in touch with Jean. For the first time in years. He suggests they start working together again. From here on, things spiral out of control.

5.7

Bastards

Marco returns to Paris after his brother-in-law's suicide, where he targets the man his sister believes caused the tragedy – though he is ill-prepared for her secrets as they quickly muddy the waters.

5.2

Let the Sunshine In

Isabelle, Parisian artist, divorced mother, is looking for love, true love, at last.

6.7

White Material

In the midst of a volatile regime change in a Francophone African state, Maria Vial is fighting to sustain her family’s coffee plantation. With rebels and the army struggling for control, French peacekeeping forces move out, warning the remaining white residents that they’re on their own. But Maria refuses to be driven off the land, even as tragedy looms.

6.9

Chocolat

On her way to visit her childhood home in a colonial outpost in Northern Cameroon, a young French woman recalls her childhood, her memories concentrating on her family's houseboy.

6.2

The Passerby

Max Baumstein is a reputable businessman who founded an international organization fighting against violations of human rights. Why would he commit an act that apparently negates the principles he has striven for so long to uphold? As he is tried for first-degree murder for killing a Paraguayan ambassador in cold blood, he reveals a secret about himself that he kept hidden from his wife Lina. His act is the conclusion of a struggle that started many decades earlier in his childhood...

5.0

All the Boys and Girls of Their Time

Tous les garçons et les filles de leur âge... is a French anthology tv series. Filmmakers were given the opportunity to portray an episode about the coming of age of young people during one of the past few decades, accompanied by music of that period.

4.7

Cinéma, de notre temps

"Cinema of Our Time" is a documentary series about contemporary filmmakers from around the world, created by Janine Bazin and André S. Labarthe, as a follow-up to the acclaimed initial series "Filmmakers of Our Time" (1964-1972).