Jacques Tati : his Life and Art

Informationen zum Autor David Bellos Klappentext A Frenchman of Russian origins, Jacques Tati worked as a picture-framer and a music-hall mime before being drawn into the world of the French cinema and making the films that rank him with the most popular comedy actor/directors in any country. He brought to his films--"Jour de Fete, Monsieur Hulot's Holidays, Mon Oncle, Playtime" and others--a healthy openness to new technology in movie-making and a rigorous precision, the hallmark of many great clowns, in the execution of each scene. In this, the first complete, authoritative biography of the French icon, David Bellos has had the complete collaboration of Tati's daughter, and the freedom to examine hitherto inaccessible archives including film footage, videos, taped interviews, and early drafts of shooting scripts. What emerges is the picture of a man at once dedicated, impassioned, and shy, more an artist than a man of business. Zusammenfassung The full story of one of France's greatest cinema legends, a clown whose film-making innovation was to turn everyday life into an art form. Jacques Tati's Monsieur Hulot, unmistakable with his pipe, brolly and striped socks, was a creation of slapstick genius that made audiences around the world laugh at the sheer absurdity of life.

Préface
The fascinating story behind one of France's greatest cinema legends. Bellos's elegantly written, illuminating biography charts the rise and fall of Jacques Tati

Auteur
David Bellos is a professor of French and Comparative Literature at Princeton where he is also director of the Program in Translation and Intercultural Communication. He won the Prix Goncourt de la Biographie for George Perec: A Life in Words. He also won the IBM-France prize for his translated W or The Memory of Childhood, Things: A Story of the Sixties and 53 Days, all major works by George Perec. In 2005 he won the Man Booker International translator's award for his translations of several works by the Albanian novelist Ismail Kadare.

Texte du rabat

A Frenchman of Russian origins, Jacques Tati worked as a picture-framer and a music-hall mime before being drawn into the world of the French cinema and making the films that rank him with the most popular comedy actor/directors in any country. He brought to his films--"Jour de Fete, Monsieur Hulot's Holidays, Mon Oncle, Playtime" and others--a healthy openness to new technology in movie-making and a rigorous precision, the hallmark of many great clowns, in the execution of each scene. In this, the first complete, authoritative biography of the French icon, David Bellos has had the complete collaboration of Tati's daughter, and the freedom to examine hitherto inaccessible archives including film footage, videos, taped interviews, and early drafts of shooting scripts. What emerges is the picture of a man at once dedicated, impassioned, and shy, more an artist than a man of business.

Résumé

The full story of one of France's greatest cinema legends, a clown whose film-making innovation was to turn everyday life into an art form.

Jacques Tati's Monsieur Hulot, unmistakable with his pipe, brolly and striped socks, was a creation of slapstick genius that made audiences around the world laugh at the sheer absurdity of life. This biography charts Tati's rise and fall, from his earliest beginnings as a music hall mime during the Depression, to the success of Jour de F*ête and *Mon Oncle, to Playtime, the grandiose masterpiece that left the once celebrated director bankrupt and begging for equipment to complete his final films.

Analysing Tati's singular vision, Bellos reveals the intricate staging of his most famous gags and draws upon hitherto inaccessible archives to produce a unique assessment of his work and its context for film lovers and film students alike.