Pierre Chenal
Director
30
Movies
0
TV Shows
Philippe Cohen, known as Pierre Chenal, is a French director, born December 5, 1904 in Brussels and died December 23, 1990 in La Garenne-Colombes.
Chenal occupies an uncomfortable place in the history of French cinema: relatively unknown, he is cataloged as a filmmaker who left only a light body of work. His detailed filmography, however, tends to show the opposite. Made in the 1930s, his first short films were documentaries where the filmmaker used social realism. The Little Trades of Paris (1932) or A French City of Cinema had a didactic ambition which ranked him among the innovators at the time.
Throughout his work, Pierre Chenal will maintain this taste for atmospheres tinged with truth where the social is shown. Hence his very marked penchant for adaptations of literary works by his contemporaries: he borrowed from Marcel Aymé the title of one of his first feature films, La rue sans nom (1933); summons Pirandello and The Man from Nowhere (1937); depicts The Mutineers of Elsinore by Jack London; and transforms James Cain's novel The Postman Always Rings Twice to give The Last Turn.
Pierre Chenal loves actors and casts the biggest ones. Louis Jouvet, Robert Le Vigan, Michel Simon, Pierre Blanchar, Viviane Romance and Albert Préjean praise his talent. In 1940, the filmmaker's career took a new turn when he retreated, during the war, to Argentina and Chile. He made a few minor films there, then returned to France with comic intentions expressed in Clochemerle (1947). In 1948, Chenal returned to Argentina and adapted Sangre Negra by the American noir novelist Richard Wright. Then, he developed a passion for thrillers and experimented with the genre on several occasions. But Raid on the City (1958), The Beast on the Prowl (1959) and The Assassin Knows the Music (1963) are not considered to be his best films.
Behind the Camera
Les belles au bois dormantes
Director
L'Alibi
Director
La Maison du Maltais
Director
Native Son
Director, Guionista
Le martyre de l'obèse
Director
Section des disparus
Director, Guionista
La Rue sans nom
Escritor, Director
El ídolo
Guionista, Director
Todo un hombre
Director
Rafles sur la ville
Director, Guionista
El muerto falta a la cita
Director, Escritor
L'assassin connaît la musique
Director, Escritor
Le Dernier Tournant
Director
L’ultimo zar
Escritor, Director
L'Homme de nulle part
Director, Guionista
Crime et Châtiment
Director, Escritor
Bâtir
Director, Escritor, Productor
La Foire aux chimères
Director
L'Affaire Lafarge
Director
Le hasard mène le Jeu
Escritor, Director
Clochemerle
Director
La Bête à l'affût
Director
El viaje sin regreso
Director
Les Jeux dangereux
Director, Guionista
Les mutinés de l'Elseneur
Guionista, Director
Petits métiers de Paris
Dir. de Fotografía, Editor, Director
Se abre el abismo
Director
Paris Cinéma
Editor, Director
L'Architecture d'Aujourd'hui
Dir. de Fotografía, Escritor, Director
Les suites d'un premier lit
Director