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2. The Young Woman Alone: Isabelle Huppert, Isabelle Adjani, and Nathalie Baye

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The Beauty of the Real
This chapter is in the book The Beauty of the Real
2The Young Woman AloneIsabelle Huppert, Isabelle Adjani, and Nathalie BayeFrenchcinema’sportraits of the young woman on her own constitute a strong and enriching strain in recent decades. Some of these films are romances, but just as many aren’t. Even when they are, romance and men are just conveyances for the movies’ real points of focus. These are movies all about exploring a young woman’s essence, character and soul, and many actresses begin their great careers by putting their own stamp on specifically these kinds of films.As we’ve seen, it was in precisely such a film (The Lacemaker) that Isabelle Huppert came to prominence, though in retrospect that delicate, gentle film seems almost like an intentional feint in the wrong direction. Huppert’s destiny was to play a different sort of solitary figure. Within a year of The Lacemaker, she would begin exhibiting her true calling as the Emily Dickinson of world cinema—the little lady who seems harmless, until you look into her eyes; the little lady who could blow up the world just by thinking about it. Over time, Huppert would give us some of the most exuberant portrayals of malevolence by a major actress ever, en-acting the fall and destruction of half-mad postal workers, World WarII abortionists and frustrated piano teachers.To interview Huppert after seeing forty or fifty of her films is not to expect someone twisted and evil, but it is to expect a series of un-comfortable moments squirming under a basilisk stare. After all, no one but Huppert has used stillness and silence to such unsettling effect. But the off-screen Huppert is hardly silent. She is extroverted and good-humored, jumps on questions before they’re barely uttered and talks fast
© 2020 Stanford University Press, Redwood City

2The Young Woman AloneIsabelle Huppert, Isabelle Adjani, and Nathalie BayeFrenchcinema’sportraits of the young woman on her own constitute a strong and enriching strain in recent decades. Some of these films are romances, but just as many aren’t. Even when they are, romance and men are just conveyances for the movies’ real points of focus. These are movies all about exploring a young woman’s essence, character and soul, and many actresses begin their great careers by putting their own stamp on specifically these kinds of films.As we’ve seen, it was in precisely such a film (The Lacemaker) that Isabelle Huppert came to prominence, though in retrospect that delicate, gentle film seems almost like an intentional feint in the wrong direction. Huppert’s destiny was to play a different sort of solitary figure. Within a year of The Lacemaker, she would begin exhibiting her true calling as the Emily Dickinson of world cinema—the little lady who seems harmless, until you look into her eyes; the little lady who could blow up the world just by thinking about it. Over time, Huppert would give us some of the most exuberant portrayals of malevolence by a major actress ever, en-acting the fall and destruction of half-mad postal workers, World WarII abortionists and frustrated piano teachers.To interview Huppert after seeing forty or fifty of her films is not to expect someone twisted and evil, but it is to expect a series of un-comfortable moments squirming under a basilisk stare. After all, no one but Huppert has used stillness and silence to such unsettling effect. But the off-screen Huppert is hardly silent. She is extroverted and good-humored, jumps on questions before they’re barely uttered and talks fast
© 2020 Stanford University Press, Redwood City

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents vii
  3. Introduction: Two Myths 1
  4. 1. Teen Rebellion 11
  5. 2. The Young Woman Alone: Isabelle Huppert, Isabelle Adjani, and Nathalie Baye 23
  6. 3. Juliette Binoche, Emmanuelle Béart, and the Temptations of Vanity 37
  7. 4. The Shame of Valeria Bruni Tedeschi 49
  8. 5. Sandrine Kiberlain 61
  9. 6. Sandrine Bonnaire, Isabelle Huppert, and La Cérémonie 73
  10. 7. The Allure of Hollywood 87
  11. 8. Alone at Midlife: Nathalie Baye in the Nineties 101
  12. 9. The French Meryl Streep 113
  13. 10. Agnès Jaoui 125
  14. 11. Marriage and Adultery (Same Thing) 139
  15. 12. Géraldine Pailhas and Building a Career 153
  16. 13. Isabelle Carré and Madness 165
  17. 14. Les Femmes d’un Certain Age 177
  18. 15. The New Talent 189
  19. 16. France and America 199
  20. Appendices and Reference Matter
  21. Appendix One. How to Sell French Films in the United States 215
  22. Appendix Two. How to See French Films in the United States 218
  23. Acknowledgments 227
  24. Sources 229
  25. Index 231
Readers are also interested in:
https://doi.org/10.1515/9780804782074-003

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents vii
  3. Introduction: Two Myths 1
  4. 1. Teen Rebellion 11
  5. 2. The Young Woman Alone: Isabelle Huppert, Isabelle Adjani, and Nathalie Baye 23
  6. 3. Juliette Binoche, Emmanuelle Béart, and the Temptations of Vanity 37
  7. 4. The Shame of Valeria Bruni Tedeschi 49
  8. 5. Sandrine Kiberlain 61
  9. 6. Sandrine Bonnaire, Isabelle Huppert, and La Cérémonie 73
  10. 7. The Allure of Hollywood 87
  11. 8. Alone at Midlife: Nathalie Baye in the Nineties 101
  12. 9. The French Meryl Streep 113
  13. 10. Agnès Jaoui 125
  14. 11. Marriage and Adultery (Same Thing) 139
  15. 12. Géraldine Pailhas and Building a Career 153
  16. 13. Isabelle Carré and Madness 165
  17. 14. Les Femmes d’un Certain Age 177
  18. 15. The New Talent 189
  19. 16. France and America 199
  20. Appendices and Reference Matter
  21. Appendix One. How to Sell French Films in the United States 215
  22. Appendix Two. How to See French Films in the United States 218
  23. Acknowledgments 227
  24. Sources 229
  25. Index 231
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