ABSTRACT
Women have found it difficult to succeed as directors in the French film industry and, typically, begin their careers in some other branch. Jacqueline Audry (1908-77) was a script-girl and editor before making her first feature, Les Malheurs de Sophie, in 1946. Her adaptations of Colette’s Gigi (1948), Minne, l’ingénue libertine (1950) and Mitsou (1956) rework earlier literary genres but with La Garçonne (1957) and Le Secret du chevalier d’éon (1960), and her masterpiece Olivia (1951), are also protofeminist questionings of gender roles. Yannick Bellon edited films and directed a large number of shorts, but did not make her first feature, Quelque part, quelqu’un, until 1972. Thereafter, she specialized in ‘women’s interest’ films which considered topics such as rape, breast cancer and adultery in fictions which were often inspired by true stories: La Femme de Jean (1974), L’Amour violé (1978), L’Amour nu (1981). Nadine Trintignant (Mon amour, mon amour, in 1967) and Nina Companeez (Faustine et le bel été, 1971) were both editors, while many other women have come to film directing via acting: Juliet Berto, with Neige (1981), Cap Canaille (1983) and Havre (1986); Anna Karina, with Vivre ensemble (1973); and Jeanne Moreau, with Lumière (1976) and L’Adolescente (1978).
