Les courts métrages de Jacques Demy
Les courts métrages de Jacques Demy
Three early short films by Jacques Demy, revealing the director’s fascination with the work of Jean Cocteau (Le bel indifférent), as well as Demy’s interest in documentary (Le sabotier du Val de Loire).
Demy attracted attention with his early animated films, and eventually graduated in film from Paris’ École Technique de Cinématographie et de Photographie.
In 1953, his first documentary, the short Le sabotier du Val de Loire, won an award at the Berlin Film Festival.
In 1957, Demy got permission through the actor Jean Marais from writer/filmmaker Jean Cocteau to film his play Le bel indifférent, a frosty story of the unbridgeable gulf between two lovers. This was followed by another independent short, Ars (1959).
Programme
Le sabotier du Val de Loire (1956, 35mm, b&w, 23’)
Portrait of an ageing clog-maker in the small town of La Chapelle-Basse-Mer in the Loire Valley. The clog-maker’s thoughts are presented in voice-over; his life, his marriage, a friend who died, and the meaning of his – disappearing – trade. The clog-maker gave shelter to director Demy and his brother for a while following the bombing of Nantes. Winner of a Best Short Documentary at the Berlin Film Festival 1956.
Le bel indifférent (1957, 35mm, colour, 23’)
Film version of the play of the same title by Jean Cocteau. A woman is waiting for her lover in a hotel room. He comes in, and reads the paper. The woman confronts her lover with everything that is wrong about their relationship; the man doesn’t respond – he’s fallen asleep. Jacques Demy said of his first fiction short: “I wanted the woman’s complaints to be recorded as calmly as possible. The pain of love also has a certain subtlety.”
Ars (1959, 35mm, b&w, 17’)
Demy filmed the winter landscapes of the villages and plains of the Ain area. During the 19th century, parish priest who went on to become a saint Jean-Marie Baptiste Vianney, known as the ‘Curé d’Ars’, lived here, in the village of Ars. Demy attempts to fathom the priest’s tortured psyche, his struggle for his faith and desire for mystical redemption.
This is part of
Special screenings
Details
Production year
2026
Length
87 min.
Country
NL
Part of
The Films of Jacques Demy
To accompany the 4K restoration of the wonderful, bittersweet musical Les parapluies de Cherbourg, other films by Jacques Demy will be screened, featuring major French film stars including Catherine Deneuve, Jeanne Moreau and Anouk Aimée.
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