Georges Franju - Thérèse Desqueyroux (1962)

After Thérèse is acquitted of trying to poison her husband, Bernard Desqueyroux, she recalls the events that lead to her being charged. At the beginning of her marriage to Bernard, the only respite she found from the stifling provincial life was the company of her sister-in-law Anne. After Anne left, she found herself trapped in a loveless marriage to a boring man, whose only interest was in preserving his family name and property. By accident, Thérèse found that an increase in Bernard's medicine made him very ill.







The fiercely anarchic and irreligious Georges Franju might seem an improbable choice to film a novel of sin and expiation by France's leading Catholic novelist—unless in a spirit of mocking parody. Yet Thérèse Desqueyroux succeeds in being both an exceptionally faithful version of François Mauriac's novel and at the same time fully consistent with Franju's own attitudes and beliefs. Mauriac himself (who co-scripted together with Franju and Mauriac's son Claude, film critic of Le Figaro littéraire) was delighted with the final film. With good reason: Thérèse Desqueyroux can be well considered one of the most successful fusions of cinema and literature ever produced. Where Franju diverges from Mauriac is in the implications he draws from the events of the story—a subtle, but crucial difference. Mauriac's Thérèse must work out, through imprisonment and suffering, expiation for her sin—which is not so much attempted murder as spiritual pride. For Franju, though, Thérèse is a victim, one of the outsiders whom society cannot accommodate and therefore persecutes or destroys—the fate of many of his protagonists, from La tête contre les Murs to La faute de l'Abbé Mouret. Building on Mauriac's austere parable, Franju constructs his own humane vision: a lucid, grave and compassionate study of isolation, rich in visual metaphor, which vividly conveys the emotional turbulence beneath its cool surface. In Franju's intense, idiosyncratic, and often uneven output, Thérèse Desqueyroux stands as perhaps his finest, most fully achieved film. (Philip Kemp)







Bénéficiaire d'un non-lieu, Thérèse Desqueyroux, prévenue de meurtre sur la personne de son mari Bernard, revient en voiture à Argelouse, sa propriété ; elle cherche comment aborder Bernard et lui expliquer son geste, car elle a réellement tenté de l'empoisonner et il le sait, (mais il a préféré faire un faux témoignage pour l'honneur de son nom). Elle revoit son adolescence heureuse en compagnie d'Anne de Latrave pour qui elle éprouve un sentiment passionné et pur, ses fiançailles avec Bernard Desqueyroux, le demi-frère d'Anne, et son mariage, le mariage de Thérèse Larroque, « la fille la plus riche des Landes, avec deux mille hectares de pins ». Déçue dès sa nuit de noce, elle découvre rapidement un Bernard sans une once d'imagination, sûr de ses jugements et de son bon droit, seulement préoccupé de son nom, des devoirs de sa caste, de sa santé et de sa fortune.





8513