''Violette'' is a 2013 French-Belgian

biographical A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or ...

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super-g ...

written and directed by

Martin Provost Martin Provost (born 13 May 1957) is a French film director, writer and actor. He wrote and directed films such as '' Séraphine'' and ''Le Ventre de Juliette''. '' Violette,'' his 2013 biographical drama about author Violette Leduc Violette ...

, about the French novelist

Violette Leduc Violette Leduc (7 April 1907 – 28 May 1972) was a French writer. Early life and education She was born in Arras, Pas de Calais, France, on 7 April 1907. She was the illegitimacy, illegitimate daughter of a servant girl, Berthe Leduc, and And ...

. It was screened in the Special Presentation section at the

2013 Toronto International Film Festival The 38th annual Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) took place in Toronto, Ontario, Canada between September 5 and 15, 2013. '' The Fifth Estate'' was selected as the opening film and '' Life of Crime'' was the closing film. 75 films were ...

Plot

During the last years of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

lives with

Maurice Sachs Maurice Sachs (born Maurice Ettinghausen, 16 September 1906, Paris – 14 April 1945, Germany) was a French-Jewish writer. Biography Sachs was the son of a Jewish family of jewelers. He was educated in an English-style boarding-school, lived fo ...

, who doesn't love her but who does encourage her to write. She seeks out

Simone de Beauvoir Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir (, ; ; 9 January 1908 – 14 April 1986) was a French existentialist philosopher, writer, social theorist, and feminist activist. Though she did not consider herself a philosopher, and even th ...

and eventually presents her with a draft of her first book. De Beauvoir rewards Violette's trust by reading and commenting on the book and by introducing her to contemporary intellectual icons

Jean-Paul Sartre Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism (and phenomenology), a French playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and litera ...

Jean Genet Jean Genet (; – ) was a French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. In his early life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but he later became a writer and playwright. His major works include the novels ''The Thief's ...

and

Albert Camus Albert Camus ( , ; ; 7 November 1913 – 4 January 1960) was a French philosopher, author, dramatist, and journalist. He was awarded the 1957 Nobel Prize in Literature at the age of 44, the second-youngest recipient in history. His work ...

. In 1964, the success of Violette Leduc's autobiographical

bestseller A bestseller is a book or other media noted for its top selling status, with bestseller lists published by newspapers, magazines, and book store chains. Some lists are broken down into classifications and specialties (novel, nonfiction book, cookb ...

''La Bâtarde'' enables her to earn a living from her writing.

Cast

Emmanuelle Devos Emmanuelle Devos (born 10 May 1964) is a French actress. She is the daughter of actress Marie Henriau. She won the César Award for Best Actress in 2002 for her performance in ''Sur mes lèvres'', directed by Jacques Audiard. She has also been ...

Sandrine Kiberlain Sandrine Kiberlain (born Sandrine Kiberlajn; 25 February 1968) is a French actress and singer. Her most notable roles were in the films '' The Patriots'' (1994), '' A Self Made Hero'' (1996), ''For Sale'' (1998), ''Alias Betty'' (2001), ''Madem ...

Jacques Bonnaffé Jacques Bonnaffé (born 22 June 1958) is a French actor and stage director. He has appeared in more than ninety films since 1980. Debut Jacques Bonnaffé was formed at the Lille Conservatory after his high school years in Douai (North) where he ...

Olivier Gourmet Olivier Gourmet (born 22 July 1963) is a Belgian actor. Gourmet was born in Namur. He won the Best Actor award at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival for his role in '' Le Fils'' by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne. He also appeared in ''La Promesse'' ...

as Jacques Guérin *

Catherine Hiegel Catherine Hiegel (born 10 December 1946) is a French actress, comedian and director. Personal life Catherine Hiegel is the daughter of Pierre Hiegel, radio host, music critic, radio producer and artistic director of French houses of discs. Sh ...

as Berthe Leduc *

Stanley Weber Stanley Weber (born 13 July 1986) is a French actor and theatre director. He is known for his performance as Juan Borgia in the television series '' Borgia'', and for his roles in films ''The First Day of the Rest of Your Life'' and '' Thérè ...

as Le jeune maçon

Reception

''Violette'' received generally positive reviews from critics. Review aggregation website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

reported an approval rating of 86%, based on 50 reviews, with an average score of 7.2/10. The site's consensus reads, "Led by an outstanding performance from Emmanuelle Devos, ''Violette'' is a rewarding, bracingly honest look at social mores and the literary life." At

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film received an average score of 72, based on 14 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Peter Bradshaw of ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' gave ''Violette'' 4 out of 5 and said that "Emmanuelle Devos brings enormous charisma to this story of writerly ambition and romantic disappointment".

Accolades

References

External links

*
Press kit
(en) {{DEFAULTSORT:Violette 2013 drama films 2013 biographical drama films 2013 films 2010s historical drama films French biographical drama films 2010s French-language films Belgian biographical drama films French historical drama films Belgian historical drama films Films set in Paris Films shot in Paris Biographical films about writers Films directed by Martin Provost Cultural depictions of Simone de Beauvoir Cultural depictions of French women Cultural depictions of writers French World War II films French-language Belgian films Belgian World War II films 2010s French films