Rivette, Jacques Pierre Louis, 1928–2016, French filmmaker and critic b. Rouen. One of the French New Wave directors of the 1950s and 60s, he wrote criticism for the influential journal Cahiers du Cinéma, eventually becoming its editor. There he worked with fellow directors and critics Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut, Eric Rohmer, and Claude Chabrol. Although he never achieved the fame of some other New Wave directors, Rivette was admired for his intimate, evocative, and naturalistic style. Le Coup du Berger (Fool's Mate, 1956) and his other early films were shorts. His full-length films, some of which run several hours, include Paris nous appartient (Paris Belongs to Us, 1961), La Religieuse (The Nun, 1966), L'Amour Fou [blind love] (1969), the eight-part Out 1, noli me tangere (1971), the surreal mystery Céline et Julie vont en bateau (Céline and Julie Go Boating, 1974), Le pont du Nord (1982), L'Amour par terre (Love on the Ground, 1984), La Bande des quatre (Gang of Four, 1989), and his most critically acclaimed film, La belle noiseuse [the beautiful troublemaker] (1991), about a painter and his model. Rivette also made costume dramas, including Jeanne la pucelle [Joan the maiden] (1994, parts I and II), about Joan of Arc, and Ne touchez pas la hache (The Duchess of Langeais, 2007), based on a story by Balzac.
See studies by M. Wiles (2012) and M. Douglas and S. Alison (2015).
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