Midsummer Nightmare: Devil’s Daughter and The Back Streets of Paris
THURSDAY, JULY 26
THE FRENCH HAD A NAME FOR IT’s MIDSUMMER NIGHTMARE
“[Andrée] Clément (1918-54) was a seriously weird and interesting talent, with a quality unlike anyone else: fierce, intelligent, desperate, scary and uncompromising.”
—Mick La Salle, San Francisco Chronicle
Midcentury Productions’ executive director Don Malcolm has heard the clamor for more French noir—even before the upcoming FRENCH HAD A NAME FOR IT 5 this November. So he’s devised a new feature in the singular series—a one-night stand to tide you over till the Fall extravaganza. Join him at San Francisco’s Roxie Theater on Thursday evening, July 26 as he shines a light on the most unusual actress in the entire French film noir canon—ANDRÉE CLÉMENT in two startling mid-40s noirs.
“We call her the first ‘Goth girl’ for her modern look, her intensity and her unique mingling of darkness and innocence,” says Don. “Tragedy hung over her: she lost her husband at age 21 due to World War II. Her health, always fragile, betrayed her: she was only 35 when she died.”
Louis Jouvet called her “my angel of darkness.” Serge Reggiani claimed that no actress ever gave him the kind of shivers she induced in him when they worked together. Her filmography is slight—just 13 films—but she’s indelible in all of them.
“Resurrected […] for a Roxie double bill culled from the dozen-odd movies she made between 1943 and her premature death in 1954, [Andrée] Clément possessed an unpredictability and instinctiveness that gave her a wild-card quality. Especially in the crime-slash-relationship dramas on view July 26, she seems perpetually on the verge of breaking some convention of (im)polite society.”
—Michael Fox, KQED
Fans of THE FRENCH HAD A NAME FOR IT—here’s a fantastic way for you to get warmed up for the fifth annual French noir fest coming this November. Join Don on July 26 and get the first lowdown on another year of incredible rediscoveries! Come see why the biggest names in French film & theatre went gaga over “Goth girl” Andrée Clément…you’ll agree that this unique actress is yet another treasure from the “lost continent” of French film noir.
TICKET INFO Tickets are $12 general admission, and $9 for Roxie members. Note that all seating is first-come first-seated.