Alexandre Mnouchkine

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Alexandre Mnouchkine ( Russian Александр Александрович Мнушкин , Alexander Alexandrovich Mnuschkin wissenschaftl.-translit .:, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Mnuškin , * 10. February 1908 in Saint Petersburg ; † 3. April 1993 in Neuilly-sur-Seine , Hauts-de-Seine department ) was a Russian - French film producer .

biography

Alexandre Mnouchkine was born in St. Petersburg in 1908, then the capital of the Russian Empire . After the outbreak of the Russian Revolution , he and his family fled to France , where he received French citizenship in 1930. In his new home, the young Mnouchkine tried as a musician, but soon turned to the movie to where he was the pianist in the silent film productions by René Clair was involved. Although he himself had flirted with a career as a cameraman , Mnouchkine began working as a film producer in 1932 before the Second World War interrupted his career. As a Jew he was forced to go into hiding during this time and he acted as a member of the Résistance , the French resistance movement, against the German occupation forces . After the end of World War II, Mnouchkine reappeared as a film producer. Together with Georges Dancigers (1908–1993) and Francis Cosne (1916–1984), who also immigrated from Russia , he founded the production company Les Films Ariane in 1945 , which he named after his daughter Ariane Mnouchkine , who was born in 1939 . The later successful theater and film director, who criticized his film selection as too commercial, came like his second daughter Joelle from his marriage to the Englishwoman June Hannen, whose father was the popular stage actor Nicholas Hannen (1881-1972).

Alexandre Mnouchkine produced Henri Decoin's crime drama Not Guilty with Les Films Ariane in 1947 . A year later followed two works by Jean Cocteau with The Double Eagle and The Terrible Parents , in which the film director's partner, Jean Marais , played the leading male roles. Mnouchkine admired the professionalism that Cocteau displayed and believed that their collaboration had enriched his own visions of art and cinema. In the early 1950s, Mnouchkine turned to commercial cinema and acted as a producer and co-producer on, among others, Christian-Jacques Mantel-und-Degen-Films Fanfan, the Husar with Gérard Philipe in the title role and Lucrezia Borgia (both 1952), Julien Duvivier's Don Camillo's return (1953) or the espionage comedy Babette goes to war (1959) with the young Brigitte Bardot in the lead role. The great success for Mnouchkine and Dancigers came in the 1960s, when a long-term collaboration with Philippe de Broca followed, from which the comedies Cartouche, the Bandit (1961), Adventure in Rio (1964), The great adventures of Monsieur, among others L. (1965) and Le Magnifique (1973) emerged. Jean-Paul Belmondo played the lead role in all of the films . The influential performer of the Nouvelle Vague was France's most popular actor at the time. Les Films Ariane then established itself in France as one of the major film production companies and Mnouchkine succeeded in building a bridge between commerce and the prestigious auteur cinema . "He was an inspiration to a generation of filmmakers," and "a very committed man who loved films," said his professional colleague Frederic Golchan. Mnouchkine financed projects by renowned filmmakers with the same enthusiasm, such as Live the Life (1967), The Man I Like and The Life, Love, Death (both 1969) by Claude Lelouch , Alain Resnais ' drama Stavisky , Bertrand Bliers Oscar - award-winning tragic comedy Frau zu give away (1978) or the César winner La Balance - Der Verrat (1982) by Bob Swaim . Mnouchkine was even awarded the most important French film prize in 1981, when he and Georges Dancigers received the honorary prize for his services in French cinema . In the same year, the jointly produced thriller The Interrogation by Claude Miller was awarded four Césars, which more and more films of this genre followed.

In addition to his work as a producer, Alexandre Mnouchkine occasionally took on extra roles in films, such as in Gérard Krawczyk's highly acclaimed feature film debut I hate actors! (1986). In the same year Mnouchkine was a jury member at the Cannes Film Festival , while Les Films Ariane was bought by the Cora Reveillon group. Although he lost his position as director, he became the new owner's in-house producer and co-produced works such as Jean-Jacques Annaud's literary film adaptation The Name of the Rose (1986) or Giuseppe Tornatores Oscar-winning drama Cinema Paradiso (1988). In 1989 Mnouchkine held the office of President of the Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma , which annually awards the French César film prize, and was responsible for the international co-production The French Revolution - Years of Hope / Years of Anger with Klaus Maria Brandauer as Georges Danton and Jane Seymour in the role of Marie Antoinette . Robert Enrico's and Richard T. Heffron's two- parter , with a budget of 50 million US dollars at the time, was the most expensive European film, and Mnouchkine was particularly attracted by the fact that the project was considered impossible. In the last years of his life, the film producer moved closer to his native Russia , where he financed Eldar Ryazanov's film Predskazaniye . He also co-wrote the script for the romantic thriller starring Irène Jacob . Married to the French actress Simone Renant (1911-2004) for the second time since 1975 , Mnouchkine died of heart failure at the age of 85. In 1981 Mnouchkine, who was valued by the former United Artists International President Lee Katz (1914–2003) as an “unsurpassed force in French cinema and a true gentleman” , suffered a serious heart attack. In his career, Alexandre Mnouchkine produced almost fifty films, including the 1994 thriller A Pure Formality by Giuseppe Tornatore.

Filmography (selection)

Awards

  • 1982: Honorary Prize at the César Awards
  • 1990: Nomination for the Gemini Award for The French Revolution - Years of Hope / Years of Wrath (Best Dramatic Miniseries)

literature

  • Passek, Jean Loup (Ed.): Dictionnaire du cinéma . Paris: Larousse, 1987 (French edition)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ cf. Interpreter of popular culture . In: Manchester Guardian Weekly, April 25, 1993, Le Monde, Obituary, Alexandre Mnouchkine, p. 14
  2. ↑ a b cf. Robinson, David: In The Face Of Fashion . In: The Guardian (London), April 13, 1993, p. 16
  3. ↑ cf. Shipman, David: Obituary: Alexandre Mnouchkine . In: The Independent (London), April 7, 1993, Gazette Page, p. 22
  4. ↑ a b cf. Frodon, Jean Michel: Cinema la mort d'Alexandre Mnouchkine . In: Le Monde, April 7, 1993, Culture
  5. ↑ a b c cf. Klady, Leonard: Oscar-Winning Gallic Pic Prod'r Mnouchkine Dies. In: Daily Variety, April 5, 1993, Obituaries
  6. ↑ cf. Alexandre Mnouchkine . In: The Times, April 10, 1993
  7. ↑ cf. Film producer Alexandre Mnouchkine has died . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung of April 7, 1993
personal data
SURNAME Mnouchkine, Alexandre
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mnushkin, Aleksandr (Russian); Mnouchkine, Alexander; Mnuschkin, Alexander Alexandrovich; Мнушкин, Александр Александрович
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Russian-French film producer
DATE OF BIRTH February 10, 1908
PLACE OF BIRTH Saint Petersburg , Russian Empire
DATE OF DEATH April 3, 1993
Place of death Neuilly-sur-Seine , Hauts-de-Seine department , France