avant-garde
In the arts and literature, the term ''avant-garde'' ( meaning or ) identifies an experimental genre or work of art, and the artist who created it, which usually is aesthetically innovative, whilst initially being ideologically unacceptable ...
for his unorthodox directing methods, Perret introduced innovative camera, lighting and film scoring techniques to French cinema.
Perret began his career as a relatively undistinguished stage actor. He was recruited to the film industry by the
short films
A short film is a film with a low running time. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of not more than 40 minutes including all credits". Other film o ...
gained significant accolade in French cinematography. Until his emigration to the United States in 1917, he was a fixture of the Gaumont Film Company. On American soil, he produced several popular films, the most notable being ''Lest We Forget'' (''N'oublions jamais'') in 1918.
After returning to France, he directed the successful '' Koenigsmark'' in 1923. His film '' Madame Sans-Gêne'' (1925), starring
Gloria Swanson
Gloria Mae Josephine Swanson (March 27, 1899April 4, 1983) was an American actress. She first achieved fame acting in dozens of silent films in the 1920s and was nominated three times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, most famously for h ...
, was the first joint Franco-American film production. In addition, Perret collaborated with many of the French and American idols of his generation such as
Mae Murray
Mae Murray (born Marie Adrienne Koenig; May 10, 1885 – March 23, 1965) was an American actress, dancer, film producer, and screenwriter. Murray rose to fame during the silent film era and was known as "The Girl with the Bee-Stung Lips" and "Th ...
Niort
Niort (; Poitevin: ''Nià u''; ; ) is a commune in the Deux-Sèvres department, western France. It is the prefecture of Deux-Sèvres.
The population of Niort is 58,707 (2017) and more than 177,000 people live in the urban area.
Geography
T ...
Boulevard Saint-Michel
The Boulevard Saint-Michel () is one of the two major streets in the Latin Quarter of Paris, France, the other being the Boulevard Saint-Germain. It is a tree-lined boulevard which runs south from the Pont Saint-Michel on the Seine and Place ...
near the Luxembourg Garden. Here, he was able to immerse himself in his favorite books. His health complications came back, but he made a slow recovery. Later, he was granted a medical exemption from military service on 21 March 1901.
Introduction to theatre
Perret enrolled in the new music school,
Schola Cantorum
The Schola Cantorum de Paris ( being ) is a private conservatory in Paris. It was founded in 1894 by Charles Bordes, Alexandre Guilmant and Vincent d'Indy as a counterbalance to the Paris Conservatoire's emphasis on opera.
History
The Schol ...
, located in the
Montparnasse
Montparnasse () is an area in the south of Paris, France, on the left bank of the river Seine, centred at the crossroads of the Boulevard du Montparnasse and the Rue de Rennes, between the Rue de Rennes and boulevard Raspail. It is split betwee ...
neighborhood of Paris. His talent as an excellent singer and
flute
The flute is a member of a family of musical instruments in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, producing sound with a vibrating column of air. Flutes produce sound when the player's air flows across an opening. In th ...
Switzerland
Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...
Émile Augier
Guillaume Victor Émile Augier (; 17 September 182025 October 1889) was a French dramatist. He was the thirteenth member to occupy seat 1 of the on 31 March 1857.
Biography
Augier was born at Valence, Drôme, the grandson of Pigault Lebrun, an ...
. He gained much theatrical experience during those years. Perret the actor began to get himself noticed by his performances, especially when he started acting at the
Vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France in the middle of the 19th century. A ''vaudeville'' was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a drama ...
. He continued to tour in the theatres of Paris, the provinces of France, and sometimes Europe; however, he had severe financial difficulties during this period since he was rarely given the leading role.
In 1909, he was employed for several months in a
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...
theatre during another trip to Russia. On the way back to France he stopped in
Berlin
Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
to act in the play ''
Cyrano de Bergerac
Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac ( , ; 6 March 1619 – 28 July 1655) was a French novelist, playwright, epistolarian, and duelist.
A bold and innovative author, his work was part of the libertine literature of the first half of the 17th ce ...
''. It was there that Mr. Grassi, the director of Gaumont Germany, recruited him for a new occupation: filmmaking.
Film career
Perret saw working behind a camera as an extension of his theatrical work, unlike the rest of the theatre world who looked down on the cinema. In 1909, he directed his first three short films in Berlin. They included the pacifist film ''Pourquoi la guerre?'' Next, he began directing short films of 4–5 minutes from his own screenplays, such as ''Le Bon Juge'' and ''Fan-Fan le petit grenadier''.
From Berlin, he went back to Paris and found employment at the
Louis Feuillade
Louis Feuillade (; 19 February 1873 – 25 February 1925) was a French filmmaker of the silent film, silent era. Between 1906 and 1924, he directed over 630 films. He is primarily known for the crime serial film, serials ''Fantômas (1913 ser ...
. He started out there as an actor in a good number of films shot in the Gaumont studios at 53, rue de la Villette. He then moved up the ladder quickly at Gaumont thanks to his directing experience from Berlin. Around this time he met Valentine Petit, a singer and dancer who was working at the
Folies Bergère
150px, Stanisław Julian Ignacy Ostroróg">Walery, 1927
The Folies Bergère () is a cabaret music hall in Paris, France. Located at 32 Rue Richer in the 9th Arrondissement, the Folies Bergère was built as an opera house by the arc ...
Moulin Rouge
Moulin Rouge (, ; ) is a cabaret in Paris, on Boulevard de Clichy, at Place Blanche, the intersection of, and terminus of Rue Blanche.
In 1889, the Moulin Rouge was co-founded by Charles Zidler and Joseph Oller, who also owned the Olympia (Par ...
. Suzanne subsequently became quite popular.
Even though the public still didn't know Perret by name, his face was starting to become familiar. In fact, until 1913, the names of the director and actors were not included in the credits due to the studios' near-prohibition. One day, Perret demanded that Gaumont and Louis Feuillade include the leading actors' names in the credits, a precedent that was soon followed by all the other directors of the time.
Trying new techniques, Perret progressively filmed more outdoors and, sometimes, outside of Paris. He even experimented with the police genre with the trilogy ''Main de fer''. The same year Perret directed ''L'Enfant de Paris'', the film that would mark the end of his financial difficulties and make his reputation as one of the best French directors of his era. ''L'Enfant de Paris'' was subsequently remade several times. Perret demonstrated with this film that French filmmaking technique rivaled that of the Americans, even the technique of the eminent American director D. W. Griffith.
Furthermore, at a showing of ''L'Enfant de Paris'' at the French Film Library in 1951,
Georges Sadoul
Georges Sadoul (; 4 February 1904 – 13 October 1967) was a French film critic, journalist and cinema writer. He is known for writing encyclopedias of film and filmmakers, many of which have been translated into English.
Biography
Sadoul w ...
World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, Perret directed several patriotic and
jingoistic
Jingoism is nationalism in the form of aggressive and proactive foreign policy, such as a country's advocacy for the use of threats or actual force, as opposed to peaceful relations, in efforts to safeguard what it perceives as its national inter ...
Victor Hugo
Victor-Marie Hugo, vicomte Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romanticism, Romantic author, poet, essayist, playwright, journalist, human rights activist and politician.
His most famous works are the novels ''The Hunchbac ...
's novels.
Until 1916, Perret alternated between patriotic and sentimental films. Even though he was named artistic director of Gaumont in 1915 in place of Feuillade (who was fighting on the front), he began complaining about the lack of financial resources Gaumont was willing to commit to his films. Perret wanted to direct bigger budget films. His contract with Gaumont was set to expire at the end of 1916.
American film producer
Perret believed that "the cinema has won the freedom to go where it chooses throughout the world and has become a universal medium that facilitates open artistic and commercial exchanges." He arrived in the United States in February 1917, just a few weeks before the U.S. joined the Allied forces in World War I. He settled in
Richmond, Virginia
Richmond ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), U.S. commonwealth of Virginia. Incorporated in 1742, Richmond has been an independent city (United States), independent city since 1871. ...
, a region that was at the time developing a filmmaking industry in competition with Hollywood.
A favorable contract was signed with the World Film Company, an independent production company founded by Jules Brulatour and Lewis J. Selznick. This was a sizable community of expatriate French directors in America looking to participate in the rapidly growing American film industry. His first film shot in the U.S. was '' The Silent Master'', based on a novel by Phillips Oppenheim. ''A Modern Othello'' quickly followed, based on a short story by the French writer Ernest M. Laumann.
Shortly afterwards, he directed ''Lest We Forget'', which showed the world the image of a heroic and wounded France. The postwar propaganda was released in 1918 and was enormously successful in France. Its release shortly preceded the signing of the armistice that ended World War I. This film and other film successes during that year supplied Perret with enough money to start his own production company: Perret Pictures, Inc., which was affiliated with the distributor
Mae Murray
Mae Murray (born Marie Adrienne Koenig; May 10, 1885 – March 23, 1965) was an American actress, dancer, film producer, and screenwriter. Murray rose to fame during the silent film era and was known as "The Girl with the Bee-Stung Lips" and "Th ...
. His 1920 film, ''The Lifting Shadows'', strongly criticized the newly ascended powers in Russia and revealed Perret's prejudices towards
Bolshevism
Bolshevism (derived from Bolshevik) is a revolutionary socialist current of Soviet Leninist and later Marxist–Leninist political thought and political regime associated with the formation of a rigidly centralized, cohesive and disciplined p ...
. His string of successful films continued until 1921 when an economic recession in the U.S. put the brakes on the burgeoning film industry.
International success
Perret decided to give up working in the United States for good at the end of summer 1921. His passion for the renewal of French cinematography was evident in this statement:
"The artistic, economic, scientific and social ambitions of the film industry are so strong that its potential is limitless. It should be one of our most important domestic industries. But to get French film back on top, a place it never should have lost, and to assure its global expansion, the domestic film industry has to have a global vision in its subject matter, artisanship and casting. Our great history and tradition can provide the inspiration for international films, a fact that is not unknown to our foreign competitors who have pulled their story lines for their latest films from French history as told by our most famous novelists and playwrights."
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...
and starring
Gloria Swanson
Gloria Mae Josephine Swanson (March 27, 1899April 4, 1983) was an American actress. She first achieved fame acting in dozens of silent films in the 1920s and was nominated three times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, most famously for h ...
, was the first joint Franco-American film production. The retelling of the French Revolution overthrowing
King Louis XVI
Louis XVI (Louis-Auguste; ; 23 August 1754 – 21 January 1793) was the last king of France before the fall of the monarchy during the French Revolution. The son of Louis, Dauphin of France (son and heir-apparent of King Louis XV), and Mari ...
enjoyed record box office receipts in both France and the United States. Unfortunately, ''Madame Sans-Gêne'' is now considered a
lost film
A lost film is a feature film, feature or short film in which the original negative or copies are not known to exist in any studio archive, private collection, or public archive. Films can be wholly or partially lost for a number of reasons. ...
since no copies of the film are known to exist.Sam Staggs, ''Spotlight on Sunset Boulevard''
Perret was one of the benchmarks of French cinema in his era; his films were regularly greeted with critical acclaim. 1926 and 1927 saw the release of ''La Femme nue'' based on the play by Henry Bataille and ''Morgane la sirène'' based on the novel by Charles Le Goffic. A new production and distribution company entered onto the French film scene at the end of March 1927: Franco-Film. Perret was named artistic director and board member of this new company operating out of the Rex Ingram studios in
Technicolor
Technicolor is a family of Color motion picture film, color motion picture processes. The first version, Process 1, was introduced in 1916, and improved versions followed over several decades.
Definitive Technicolor movies using three black-and ...
Ricardo Cortez
Ricardo Cortez (born Jacob Kranze or Jacob Krantz; September 19, 1900 – April 28, 1977) was an American actor and film director. He was also credited as Jack Crane early in his acting career.
Early years
Ricardo Cortez was born Jacob K ...
as well as Xenia Desni and Marcya Capri) and another film adaptation of a Henry Bataille play called ''La Possession'' (with the Italian actress Francesca Bertini).
Perret left an indelible mark on the cinema of the 1920s. Often called the "magician of film" by his peers, he clearly belongs in the silent film hall of fame.
Henri Langlois
Henri Langlois (; 13 November 1914 – 13 January 1977) was a French film archivist and cinephile. A pioneer of film preservation, Langlois was an influential figure in the history of cinema. His film screenings in Paris in the 1950s are often ...
Belgium
Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...
's novel ''Sapho'' in 1933. As he had already acted in a stage adaptation of the novel when he was doing theatre, he knew the subject well. In 1934, while working with the
, Perret tried an experimental type of play-documentary from
Molière
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, ; ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the great writers in the French language and world liter ...
's body of work. Although the experiment was met with limited success, it proved to be an inspiration for other artists such as
Sacha Guitry
Alexandre-Pierre Georges "Sacha" Guitry (; 21 February 188524 July 1957) was a French stage actor, film actor, director, screenwriter, and playwright of the boulevard theatre (aesthetic), boulevard theatre. He was the son of a leading French ac ...
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...
in New York City organized a film exhibition showcasing Perret's work. The
exhibits recently restored films annually at the Museum of Modern Art. In 2003, a selected collection of Perret's best films were restored from nitrite negatives and showcased at this exhibition. The films were selected by Martine Offroy, who was the curator of Gaumont Film Company. The Gaumont Film Company and the
Ministry of Culture Ministry of Culture may refer to:
* Ministry of Tourism, Cultural Affairs, Youth and Sports (Albania)
* Ministry of Culture (Algeria)
* Ministry of Culture (Argentina)
* Minister for the Arts (Australia)
* Ministry of Culture (Azerbaijan)Ministry o ...
.
Filmography
A definitive filmography for Perret would be virtually impossible given that he wrote, acted in, directed or produced more than 400 films. Of those more than 400 films, only roughly one third are still available today. The remaining copies are stored mostly at the Gaumont Film Library, the French Film Library, the National Cinematography Film Archives and in several other European film libraries such as the Nederlands Filmmuseum in Amsterdam.
Actor
Director
Screenwriter
Perret wrote the screenplays for the vast majority of his movies, with the exception of those from his early apprenticeship period (before 1913). Most of the movies from his apprenticeship period were written by
Louis Feuillade
Louis Feuillade (; 19 February 1873 – 25 February 1925) was a French filmmaker of the silent film, silent era. Between 1906 and 1924, he directed over 630 films. He is primarily known for the crime serial film, serials ''Fantômas (1913 ser ...