Francois Truffaut and Jean Genet

This is my translation of the entry for Jean Genet from Le Dictionnaire Truffaut edited by Antoine de Baecque and Arnaud Guigue. Noel Herpe provided this entry and it appears on pages 178-179.

Jean Genet is, first off, the great literary mirror of Truffaut, a child, if not criminal, at least, unloved and made to feel guilty by all the forms of bourgeois order...In the state of rebellion and aimlessness that is his right after the war, when he has just become seduced by another anarchic self-exaltation, that of Sacha Guitry's Le roman d'un tricheur, we learns that the young man selected the author of The Thief's Journal as a writing master, through a process of psychological identification where an autobiographical undertaking takes shape. This double dimension is plain in this 1951 letter to Robert Lachenay:
"I have sent...an article 'Jean Genet, My Comrade'. I don't know if it will be published because of established morality...If you somewhere happen on The Thief's Journal...read it...it simply is overwhelming, a little like J-J Rousseau (whom I have not read!).
The article wasn't published, but sent to Genet by Gallimard, young man scored a cordial invitation from the writer to pay him a visit...It is the beginning of a friendship which presents slightly the libertarian side of Bazinian messianism: while the apostle of Travail et Culture helped Truffaut to be (re)born in cinephile engagement, Genet cultivate alternatively his desire for encounter and his hatred of dogma.

Undergoing a moral crisis on the threshold of his 40s, he threw himself into this double renewal, "...when I saw you entering my room, I thought I saw myself, almost an hallucination, when I was 19. I do hope that you will preserve, for a long time, this severity of regard and this unaffected, and a little unfortunate, way of expressing yourself."
Genet remained a careful standard for Truffaut throughout his military and guardhouse ordeals, sending him letters, books and other things. There developed between them an odd doomed bond, as if both of them recognize in the other his aura of depression - and wanted to make of it an epical glory through a number of acts which would establish their independence class="clickable">.
For Truffaut, in custody as an army deserter, the first of these acts transpires by the keeping of an intimate journal in the manner of Genet, in which the diarist is already beginning a mise-en-scene of his interiority.
"We go to the showers in handcuffs. The first time I was embarrassed since we must cross through the hospital and people stared us down. Then I was ashamed of my shame, for doesn't the Genetienne posture command me to take pride in meriting handcuffs? So, now, before going to the showers, I light a cigarette and set my mouth into a satisfied smile with a touch of aggression."
Beyond this mimicry, Truffaut, in his polemics, practices Genet's lessons most violently by passing from the role of pariah to that of arbiter of precedences; by inverting the hierarchy, the chronicler inflicted on the cinematic establishment the perverse transmutation which the writer reserved to the marginal of society...And one finds this symbolic transgression in The Four Hundred Blows - even if, Antoine Doinel is categorically not a child criminal. Even if, Genet, likewise, distanced himself from Truffaut, accusing him of being a "vainglorious joker", preferring to stay on the other side of the barricade.

Translation of a review of "Claude Chabrol, Par lui-même et par les siens" by Serge Toubiana

Recently published in France, Claude Chabrol, Par lui-même et par les siens collects interviews given by Chabrol to journalist Michel Pascal in the last year of his life along with interviews with others who were close to him. What follows is a translation of a review published by Serge Toubiana, the director of the Cinémathèque Française, on his blog.



It is true, the cover is rather ugly. Even too ugly. It is only just about that Claude Chabrol’s face, drawn as a man-fish, are recognizable swimming in a fishbowl. Strange metaphor. Curious idea, while it would have been so much simpler, and, doubtlessly, more effective, to illustrate the cover of the book Claude Chabrol, Par lui-même et par les siens which has just appeared from the publisher Stock with a recent photo of the filmmaker.
The book was begun during Chabrol’s life by Michel Pascal. The latter did not permit his name to be listed on the cover even though he was the originator of the book. It was, he writes in his preface, it was right after the death of Eric Rohmer, on January 11, 2010 that Chabrol finally made up his mind to undertake the dialogue with a view towards publication. “What about me telling you the my real life story?” he said to him. To read this book, which is easily read and not with emotion, one wonders, was Chabrol getting himself ready for an autobiography? are the things, or aspects of his life that we are unmindful of? did he not, himself prefer his labor, his films, his body of work, to his own life? I thought that I pretty much knew everything about the man, only son of a bourgeois family, his father a pharmacist and a member of the Resistance, his severe, authoritarian mother who kept her son at a distance, and vice versa. “I was not enamoured of her, as François Truffaut. There was without doubt an issue of affection between us. I loved her at a distance trying to wipe away a tear. Madeleine was her name, and, with her, it was pure Catholicism, the appearance of strictness and honesty, the typical bourgeois of the late 19th century holding herself straight up.”
In his films, Chabrol did not settle the score with his mother, that is not a theme running through his work. The impression is that he settled the business in choosing to become a film director. The rest, the Catholic religion, the bourgeois morality, Paul Gégauff, who was his accomplice and scenarist, (perhaps of Chabrol’s best films, Les Bonnes Femmes, Que la bête meure) but also, in a sort of way, his “brain-washer” played a crucial role in the intellectual evolution of the filmmaker, “Without Gégauff, my personal evolution would have been slower and not as joyful. I. doubtlessly, would have succeeded at the same ends, but with much more difficulty. He blew apart the deadbolt at my Judeo-Christian core. He incarnated the freedom that I did not know how to gain all by myself.” No more beautiful homage.
As opposed to others - for example, Truffaut, often cited in this book -, Chabrol did not make films to tell his life-story. And nevertheless... Reading this book, conceived by Michel Pascal, begun with Chabrol and seen through to its conclusion, beyond the death of the filmmaker last September, with the participation of his family - we will come back to this - helps us to understand better how, in the work of the singular person that Chabrol was, things become interwoven. This is borne out, first off, by the frankness with which Chabrol expresses himself when he summons up his own life, through diverse passages which are as much short chapters recounted with a quick spirit and a great deal of humor. One has the feeling that Chabrol is finally letting the mask fall away, that he is no longer looking, as he had so often done, for refuge in a hearty laughter in order to sidestep the heart of the matter.
What emerges, and those who like his films - which I do, while appreciating the human qualities of the man - already know are two things. An unbelievable intelligence in its strategy of the most sophisticated mechanisms that are able to animate the human being, with their defenses, their fears, their buried desires, and also, a taste for joy. The intelligence is something readily shared among filmmakers of Chabrol’s caliber. As for joy, that’s something else. Can it be said that Godard has a taste for joy? I do not believe so. Truffaut? That’s complicated, Truffaut liked his work, his independence, but he bore on his frail shoulders all the worry of the world. Chabrol had a unbelievable capacity for reasoning, for making his sense of logic understood. He quickly found his point of equilibrium, between a relatively stable private life, that of a loving father of a family surrounded by his own, and a rigorous management of his work. Chabrol, speaking of his vision of the world: “My vision of the world was forged between 1955 and 1964, after my military service. I began by noting the bullshit around, I had true radar. I was in the clutches of a frightening spiral of events for I realized the errors being committed by people who had the same opinions as I...” The most important question regarding Chabrol is, how did he conceive this absolutely unique strategy, so different from that of his “New Wave” friends, of “making films ‘theme and variation’”. He tells Michel Pascal, “a pre-meditated act”. And he applied himself, without ever a deviation, making compromises from time to time, but without abandoning the essential: the joy of making these films, films that he choose to undertake. “There is nothing abject in venturing into all fields. I do not see why filmmakers could not be like painters who have the right to make bad canvasses, if only to deepen their art. I am not like Truffaut who wished that all of his films were equals among each other, and who was successful in that way. I wanted to film, whatever happened.”
When you understand that in his work, the taste for joy is the fundamental core, the cornerstone which pulls in all the rest, things follow naturally. Chabrol shot film after film, preserving intact in it his sense of the provocative, a logical rigor, worthy of that of a chess player, in the construction of his mise-en-scene, a continuing and replenished pleasure of exploring the Human Comedy (Balzac, Simenon). He lived a an orderly life, in turn with three women, each of whom will bear witness with intelligence and generosity in the work: Agnès Goute, his first wife, the mother of Jean-Yves and Matthieu, Stéphane Audran, the mother of Thomas, and Aurore, with whom Chabrol lived for more than thirty years, his associate and script supervisor, the mother of Cécile, who was adopted by Chabrol as his own daughter and was his assistant director.
Chabrol, in the last chapter of his remarks, evokes his wanderings. The word is new in his language, you suddenly sense in him something like fatigue - he had just passed the age of 80 -, the fear of running out of steam, of no longer being in a physical situation to make films. The last interview with Michel Pascal dates from August 2010. The man no longer has all of his robustness, he says things very gentle, and deserved, about Gérard Depardieu, with whom the meeting was late but happy (Bellamy). And Chabrol concludes thusly, “Such that they will give me three pennies and a little bit of so that I can show my wanderings, I will continue.”
Aurore Chabrol recounts her encounter with Chabrol at the beginning of the 70s (Juste avant la nuit, a masterpiece). Her testimonial. as those of others who figure in the book (Agnès Goute, Stéphane Audran, Jean-Yves Chabrol, Matthieu Chabrol, Cécile Maistre and Isabelle Huppert) is touching, most sincere and of course, intimate. But it is also in the image of the person, that is to say, droll: “I spiffed him up with nicknames that he more or less appreciated. His favorites were Hercule Poivrot, and the Ayatollah Khomédy. He lived happily, extolling the revolution but detesting the conflicts, forgiving the fly-by-night characters whose laziness or acquiescence he was a victim of... He was an egoist with a heart of gold. And rare were those who succeeded in paying a restaurant tab in his presence. He didn’t lend, he gave.“
To read this books is assuredly to spend some time in private with Chabrol, with him and those close to him, Which permits us to better know this man who spent part of his time making us believe that he was keeping his secrets. The other part of his time, he spent doing his work, a veritable œuvre, to help us better understand human reality.

Claude Chabrol, Par lui-même et par les siens, avec Michel Pascal ; Stock.

Claude Chabrol intime published on Le Blog de Serge Toubiana

Truffaut "presents" Sacha Guitry

As Criterion prepares to release its Eclipse box-set "Presenting Sacha Guitry", I thought I might share this quote from François Truffaut’s (writing as Robert Lachenay) review of Guitry’s Si Versailles m'était conté which appeared in the April 1954 issue of Cahiers du Cinema.

They [the critics] cold-shoulder him, preferring Rene Clair. I, not able to bear a repeat viewing of Belles des nuits, can freely watch and re-watch Faisons un rêve..., Les Perles de la couronne and Le Roman d’un tricheur . La Poison would make a less dishonorable Delluc than something so dreadfully boring as the likes of Les Fâcheux modernes. (Cahiers du Cinema April 1954 page 64)

Two of the three Guitry films which Truffaut can “watch and rewatch” Les Perles de la couronne and Le Roman d’un tricheur are included in the Eclipse set. La Poison is a Guitry from 1951, a year - and the only year other than the war years - in which no Prix Louis Delluc was awarded. Les Fâcheux modernes better known as Les Casse-pieds took the Delluc in 1948. In the last sentence quoted, Truffaut plays with the French language as “casse-pied” = “boring”.

Cahiers du Cinema and Joseph Mankiewicz 1953-1964

Jean-Luc Godard's film career was launch in June 1950 when he published his first review - a critique of Joseph L Mankiewicz's Dragonwyck - in the second issue of Eric Rohmer's Gazette du Cinema. So here is paragraph one of article one in the career of J-L G. (from Godard on Godard edited by Jean Narboni and Tom Milne (their translations, excerpts pages 13).

One day I went along to admire one of Ernst Lubitsch's last productions. It was Dragonwyck, a curious film in which characters from melodrama plagiarize themselves with (h)auteur and gesticulate with a solemnity equalled only on occasion by the severities of William Wyler. In France we have not yet seen The Late George Apley or Escape. But after Somewhere in the Night, the recent release in Paris of The Ghost and Mrs Muir, A Letter to Three Wives and House of Strangers suffices to to establish Joseph Mankiewicz as one of the most brilliant of American directors. I have no hesitation in placing him on the same level of importance as that held by Alberto Moravia in European literature.

Julius Caesar
Reviewed in the December 1953 issue of Cahiers de Cinema by Jean-José Richer in a double review with David Bradley's 16mm version of the Shakespeare's work from 1950. Richer's critique discusses Shakespeare for two long paragraphs before it mentions Mankiewicz (or Bradley). (page 46, excerpt my translation)
Mankiewicz is described as the "celebrated director revealed by A Letter to Three Wives" and confirm by All About Eve. Richer then goes on to say:
A seeming absence of imagination can conceal a most rich inner meaning. And, it is necessary to be on guard against hasty conclusions. Mankiewicz is not Welles; and it pleases him to cast out from the tragedy its spells, to disregard its penumbras, to shun the unformed, everything in short which fascinates the latter - in order to press it in a sharp lighting. Nothing prevents it.

The Barefoot Contessa
The July 1955 issue of Cahiers du Cinema feature four reviews of this film, from Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, François Truffaut, Philippe Demonsablon and Claude Chabrol, of The Barefoot Contessa appeared. Each of these four critics would list the film on their 10 Best Films of 1955.Jacques Doniol-Valcroze (page 40, excerpt my translation)

Must one be reminded of the staging points towards this work, Dragonwyck, Somewhere in the Night, The Ghost and Mrs Muir, Escape, The Late George Apley, A Letter to Three Wives, House of Strangers, No Way Out, All About Eve, People Will Talk, 5 Fingers, Julius Caesar? Maybe this is to remark that - on first view - the side "unrestrained" of Contessa can be found only in Dragonwyck. But on second view? The fragile and tenacious wall of the reality of common sense is crossed joyously and, to the advantage of a curious neo-romanticism in The Ghost and Mrs Muir and, above all, in the extraordinary People Will Talk. Indeed, an irony more or less latent treads its way underneath all his films. But, an anxious irony,facilely melancholy, and, often grave; and isn't this irony a modesty behind which the solid and imperturbable Joe, as his friends call him, hides a poetic and humane sensibility, which, when it finally finds expression, takes on romantic and flamboyant accents that clash loudly with the realistic and conventional norms of the cinema of today? It is thus that Contessa has the further merit of shedding light on the rest of his work and making for its consideration in a new fashion.

François Truffaut (page 41, excerpt my translation)

Seeing A Letter to Three Wives again recently, I perceived that I can no longer overlook Joseph Mankiewicz; vivid content, an intelligence where the whole is but elegance, tastefulness and refinement, content almost diabolical with precision, savior-faire and knowledge, a theatrical direction of actors to the point of impact, a sense of the timing of shots and of the efficiency of effects, that is to be found elsewhere nowhere but in the works of Cukor. All this is the art of Joseph Mankiewicz, his perfect mastery of a genre which limitations it is not yet befitting to outline since its qualities are too often ignored.
Note 658 in Eugene Walz François Truffaut : a guide to references and resources summarizes thusly the review which Truffaut contributed to the June 29 1955 issue of the weekly Arts:
"Barefoot Contessa", the portrait of a woman in four different situations, is the kind of that is either accepted or rejected in toto. Truffaut accepts it for its novelty, intelligence and beauty.
Philippe Demonsablon (page 44, excerpt my translation)

As Le Carosse d'or, The Barefoot Contessa opens many doors partway; it is attempting to find the one which leads the furthest, gleaming of numerous facets, it is attempting to the find the one which projects the most penetrating light,. To count the facets, to enumerate the doors, and to try the keys, and, even, to lift out the boxes of this game, each of which contains a larger one. I do not believe that one could succeed in rendering an account of the singular beauty of this work. It does not define itself through the sum of its elements.
Claude Chabrol (page 45, excerpt my translation)

Does The Barefoot Contessa mark the ruin of the Cartesian spirit? The French public falls into the trap of interpretation, and, into that other one, which is not excused of literary references. It falls into the trap of its own folly, clamoring for adult films and then sneering like a cabdriver when it sees one.

In the February 1956 issue of Cahiers du Cinema, Jacques Siclier contributed a critique which compared The Barefoot Contessa and Max Ophuls Lola Montès. Excerpted from that article (page 46, my translation)

The parallel with Mankiewicz's work which had enchanted us at the beginning of last summer is astonishing. The refined intellectualism of The Barefoot Contessa and the Baroque frenzy of Lola Montès would seem to have no common measure. Yet, in a different manner and spirit, both directors in the end show the same things, to the point that both portraits seem to have an identical model.

Among the younger critics at Cahiers who submitted 10 Best Films list for 1955, Charles Bitsch, Claude Chabrol, Philippe Demonsablon, Jean-José Richer, Eric Rohmer and François Truffaut cited The Barefoot Contessa. Jacques Rivette was the only representative of that group not to cite the film. 5 of the remaining 10 lists - from Alexander Astruc, Henri Agel, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Claude Mauriac and Alain Resnais - also cited the film. The lone Positif critic to post a list, Ado Kyrou, did not cite the film, nor did he cite Lola Montès. He did, however, cite The Creature from the Black Lagoon.

Thumbnail from December 1955 "Situation of American Cinema" special issue (page 56, uncredited, my translation)

The contessa went out at 5 o'clock; she was barefoot. To envisage the contribution of a Giradouxesque filmmaker, Joseph Mankiewicz has to be added to Jean Cocteau. Like Max Ophuls, Mankiewicz is bedevilled by woman and women, by Eve and Ava, their advocate, confidante, coaxer and exponent. Let them be fallen, scoffing, plotting, under-handed, his heroines are entitled all of his consideration, concern, sympathy and, let us say it, love. At last, a filmmaker who loves women and does not hide it! Up until Contessa, he was, for us, the most adroit maker of dramatic comedy, a Cukor who would be his own Kanin, a Lubitsch who has read Moravia. That is considerable! But since the contessa stripped off her shoes, all more to fire us up, Adam sees himself tempted with the golden apple by new and over-tanned Eve. An oeuvre such as that of Mankiewicz quickly finishes off the simple-minded legend according to which intelligence, elegance and urbanity don't know how to bloom and flourish in Hollywood. The truth is that he loathes nothing so much as vulgarity, most of all, Hollywood-style... Virile and distinguished, lucid and refined, accomplice of our mates and chronicler of the couple, Joseph Mankiewicz is our bedside filmmaker.

Guys and Dolls

Reviewed by Louis Marcorelles in the January 1957 issue of Cahiers du Cinema. (page 46, excerpt my translation)

Nevertheless, Guys and Dolls written and directed (produced this time by the veteran Samuel Goldwyn) by that prince of smooth talkers, Joseph Mankiewicz, seems to break with a firmly established tradition and mark the intrusion of an uncustomary irony into the genre. Mankiewicz wishes to make both All About Eve and The Bandwagon at once. That is, to blend the New York sophistication of the former with the contagious liveliness and lack of ulterior motive of the latter. His film is maybe only a half success.

In the conseil des dix, among the 2 "young turk" critics sitting, Eric Rohmer gave the film 1 star while François Truffaut bulleted it. The co-editors of Cahiers also participated in the conseil; Jacques Doniol-Valcroze gave the film 3 stars while André Bazin gave it 2 stars. Among, non-Cahiers members of that panel, Pierre Braunberger, Henri Agel and Jacques de Baroncelli gave the film 2 stars, France Roche and J-P Vivet gave it 1 star while Georges Sadoul bulleted the film.

The film appears on no 10 Best Films list.

The Quiet American

Note: The French title for the film is Un Américain bien tranquille which translates as "a really quiet American".

About one year before the release of The Quiet American in France, in its July 1957 issue, Cahiers du Cinema spotlighted the film in its "Photo of the Month" feature printing a photo from the set of the film and a short article by Raymond Jean commenting on the secrecy surrounding the screenplay.
In the August 1958 issue, the film was reviewed by co-editor Eric Rohmer. It begins (page 46, excerpt my translation):
This film is admirable and rightly deserves a disclaimer. Whoever speaks of the politique des auteurs speaks of fidelity, and, indeed, it is easier and more tempting to put one's faith in a man than in a system. Thus, you should not be to astonished to see me take the opposite view of an opinion, expressed here by me, some while ago, apropos of Les Girls. No film in Cahiers has made as much ink flow as The Barefoot Contessa and nevertheless, the cinema which we ordinarily defend in this magazine - a cinema of spatial construction and corporeal expression as our old friend André Martin would say - has barely any relation with that which that which Mankiewicz proposes to us. Even Bergman whose Secrets of Women calls to mind A Letter to Three Wives is quite distant from him.
And five pages later, it ends (page 51, excerpt my translation)
Let's keep ourselves from hasty definitions. Could we have believed, for example, that our old companion, mise-en-scene, would conceal itself behind the mantle of word-play?

Rohmer would proceed to give the film 4 stars on the conseil des dix and to place the film at the top of his list of the "10 Best Films for 1958". (He place Bergman's Secrets of Women 5th.)
Jean-Luc Godard also gave the film 4 stars on the conseil des dix and placed the film at the top of his 10 Best Films list for 1958.
From review published in Arts and reprinted in Godard on Godard critical writings by Jean-Luc Godard / edited by Jean Narboni and Tom Milne (their translations, excerpts pages 82-84).
But, after all, does Joseph L. Mankiewicz make films for the average spectator? Earlier films like A Letter to Three Wives and People Will Talk, and more recently All About Eve, and The Barefoot Contessa in particular, would seem proof to the contrary. In any case these films finally established their director as the most intelligent man in all contemporary cinema. This reputation is merely confirmed by The Quiet American. In turn scriptwriter, producer, director, and then all of them together, Mankiewicz is an all-around athlete who has more than one trick up his sleeve....But it so happens that in Joseph L. Mankiewicz we have the Giraudoux of the camera, and all is not as well as it should be. Writing Pour Lucrece is one thing, filming it another....This is the complaint one might make about Mankiewicz: that he is too perfect a writer to be a perfect director as well. Basically, what is missing from The Quiet American is cinema. It has everything - brilliant actors, sparkling dialogue - but no cinema....What a fantastic film Aldrich - not to mention Welles - would have made of this fine script which improves a hundred per cent on Graham Greene's novel. But Mankiewicz probably got so much enjoyment from the writing that there was little enough left for filming it. Though a matter for regret, The Quiet American is still the most interesting film about for this moment.
Five other "young turk" critics participated on that conseil des dix panel: besides the 4 stars from Rohmer and Godard, Charles Bitsch, Jean Domarchi, Robert Lachenay (most probably, François Truffaut) and Jacques Rivette gave the film 3 stars. Among the 4 other panelists that month: Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Henri Agel gave the film 2 stars, Georges Sadoul bulleted the film and Pierre Braunberger abstained.

Besides Rohmer and Godard, among "young turk" critics, Claude Beylie, Charles Bitsch, Philippe Demonsablon, Luc Moullet and Jacques Rivette all place the film on their list of the "10 Best Films for 1958". Jacques Demy who was then still an aspiring director who kept company with the "young turk" critics but did not himself write criticism also placed the film on his list for 1958. The lone non-Cahiers French critic among those who posted their lists to Cahiers who cited the film was Henri Agel.

In the April 1960 issue of Cahiers du Cinema, in a review of the newly released film Breathless, Luc Moullet wrote this: (page 30, my translation)
Godard made these two films [Une histoire d'eau and Charlotte et Véronique, ou Tous les garçons s'appellent Patrick] after having admired The Quiet American which inspired in him, in part, this renewal through dialogue and a taste for vertiginous construction.

Suddenly, Last Summer

This film was reviewed in the May 1960 issue of Cahiers du Cinema by Philippe Demonsablon. The discussion of the film in this review is more as a work of Tennessee Williams whose one-act play the film is based on and who is credited as co-writer of the screenplay with Gore Vidal who is never mentioned in the review. However, in considering Mankiewicz's contribution to the film, Demonsablon writes this: (page 56, excerpt my translation)

Everything about this ending of Suddenly, Last Summer demonstrates the diversity of Mankiewicz's talent which one would be wrong to limit to brilliance and intelligence. It reveals in him a poetic vein elsewhere severely constrained. The image of evoked memories frees itself at one time from photographic precision and literary symbolism reaching pure hallucination, much as the lived past rises again in Faulkner's novels. Let us not fear to venture this comparison: it expresses the magnitude of an auteur who, for a long while, has been our bedside filmmaker.

The verdict of the conseil des dix as regards the film was: among Cahiers regulars, Jean Douchet gave the film 3 stars, Luc Moullet gave it 2 stars, Fereydoun Hoveyda and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze gave it 1 star, while Louis Marcorelles and Jacques Rivette bulleted the film. Among the others on that panel: Pierre Marcabru gave the film 2 stars, Jacques de Baroncelli gave it 1 star and Jean-Pierre Melville and Claude Mauriac bulleted the film.

The film was nominated to the 10 Best Films of the year lists of Henri Agel, Philippe Demonsablon, Jean Domarchi, and Jean Douchet.

For the Dec1963/Jan1964 special issue of Cahiers du Cinema on American Cinema, this thumbnail critique of Joseph Mankiewicz was provided by Jean Douchet. (my translation.)
And the word was made Mankiewicz, who bases his direction entirely on the energy of the word. It is the vehicle of the extreme intelligence which his characters live, ands he motivates them to mark with an indelible imprint, through the construction of a durable body of work, their passage through this world. But it also remains the instrument which allows these mediocrities to warp the wall of plots, counter-plots, and machinations stand in the way of their plans. It is, above all, a tangible sign of the times which promotes the dissolution of a sumptuous construction built on the sands of time. At the same time, the word, which is gesture, acts and it loses itself in the brouhaha of that which is opposed to it before it steals away. It is magical (from whence the fact that all Mankiewicz's films are in flash-backs or reminiscences) and, in that way, illusion. This vehicle without which man can not be, reveals itself to be his worst enemy. Off-shoot of silence, the word is the pathetic and trifling proof of his existence: a murmuring rising up into the universe to signal the presence of a being whose grandeur comes from the avowal of his frailty. Such is Mankiewiecz, the cinematic virtue of the word.

Cleopatra

Reviewed in the March 1964 issue of Cahiers du Cinema by Jean-Louis Comolli (page 35, excerpt my translation

The function of the word - And, firstly, (pushing aside an immediate platitude) the word in the work of Mankiewicz, as, in the work of all great filmmakers is not an end, but, among others , a means. Where, then, is the heart of the matter? What counts more than it, first off, for Mankiewicz (as - oddly enough ? - for Godard) (both of whom, nevertheless, make profuse use of it) is the measure more or less asserted of the presence or absence of a being in face of others and also in face of its creations and its dreams. Let's observe that these variations of presence and absence, of assurance and effacement, of an advent and a vanishing constitiute from the very fact of image in motion, the lone topic specifically cinematic.

On the conseil des dix, among the Cahiers contingent, Jean Douchet gave the film 4 stars, Jean-Luc Godard gave it 2 stars while Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Jacques Rivette bulleted the film. Among the non-Cahiers contingent, Jean Collet gave the film 3 stars, Jean-Louis Bory gave it 2 stars, Jean de Baroncelli and Albert Cervoni gave it 1 star while Positif's Robert Benayoun bulleted the film as did Georges Sadoul.

The film shows up on the 10 Best Films of the year lists of Pierre-Richard Bré, Jean-Louis Comolli, Jacques Demy, Jean Douchet, Michel Mardore and Bertrand Tavernier.

Truffaut's first beef

François Truffaut review of the film Sudden Fear in the March 1953 issue of Cahiers du Cinema marked his first appearance in that revue. For the June 1953 of Cahiers, Truffaut wrote a short piece on errors in books dealing with film. Specifically, he dealt with an error in Jean Queval's monograph Marcel Carné. The quarrel that Truffaut proceeded to become embroiled in with Quéval would be the first brouhaha of his career as a critic. It is interesting that in his original piece Truffaut never names Quéval as the culprit. Also, much as A Certain Tendency would use an idea of Andre Bazin's as its springboard ("After Robert Bresson, Aurenche and Bost are the Viollet-le-Duc of French cinema."), here Truffaut also uses a Bazin quote ("Do we need to burn books on film?") as a springboard. The difference being that in this case, Bazin was writing under the pseudonym, Florent Kirsch.
The following is Truffaut's short piece and Quéval's letter to Cahiers along with Truffaut's answer to that letter.

Truffaut's short piece which was printed in Books on Cinema in June 1953 issue of Cahiers du Cinema (page 61, my translation)

The complaints are daily, concerning the difficulty of making good use of books specializing in cinema.
Rarely is the question addressed from the point of view -- essential it seems to me -- of the value of these works and of their critical or historical authority.
I open a book dedicated to Marcel Carné. I note that the author has been guided alone by the consideration of undermining the prestige of this director; now, as it happens, I bought this book to move forward in the knowledge of a filmmaker I admire. Let's admit that the intent of this book was to make me become aware of the immoderacy of my admiration for Marcel Carné. But, why is it written in this same book, "The negative of Nogent, Eldorado of dimanche has burned and there no longer exist any copies of this film." It happens that I frequent the Cinémathéque française and that every year, I see Nogent, Eldorado of dimanche there.(1) How then, if I thinking also of a rather thick and quite recent book where I read, "After Faust, Murnau filmed Tartuffe". Although Faust is from 1925 and Tartuffe from 1925, how not to respond in the affirmative to the question raised in the past by Florent Kirsch, "Do we need to burn books on film?"

(1) A copy of Nogent, Eldorado of dimanche is the property of the Club des Cinéastes Amateurs. Meanwhile, this film has been shown many times at the Ciné-Club du Quartier Latin, at Cinéum and at the Cinémathéque. It is true that the critics rarely attend these places.


Quéval's letter (Cahiers du Cinema, August September 1953, page 64 my translation)

Dear Bazin, Dear Doniol
François Truffaut takes issue with a lot of people in your latest issue with the friendly arrogance of callow youth. My advice for him is a peaceful holiday in the fresh country air. But I am responding to him only in order that a fiction will be not become accredited. A great man, in my stead, will be the victim of a venomous iconoclast.
1) It is naive to think that I would dedicate a book to an important director so as to depreciate him. In reality, my first move was to request several interviews with him. It was not I who took to initiative to discontinue them. What followed from this rupture, others, in my position, would have made public, as a matter of self-defense. I have done nothing like this because I did not wish that the failings of the man tarnish the just and high repute of the artist. But, when François Truffaut attributes me with the intention of doing harm, the roles become reversed. 50 articles bear witness that, to the contrary, I endeavor to be unbiased, without letting myself win the wager through bad temper. Later on, a few months ago, Marcel Carné announced his intention to withdraw from film. I was, at that time, the only one in the press, make no mistake about it, to beg him not to do it.
2) François Truffaut bestows on himself an award for diligence in cinema. I will concede it to him. As for me, I generally believe what I am told. I was told, "There are no existing copies of Nogent, Eldorado du dimanche and the negative has been destroyed". I wrote, "There are no existing copies of Nogent, Eldorado du dimanche and the negative has been destroyed". My source was Marcel Carné.

Yours, Jean Quéval

Truffaut's reply (Cahiers du Cinema, August September 1953, page 64 my translation)

Dear Bazin, Dear Doniol
Jean Quéval, Normand critic, bestows on himself a prize for being unbiased which I would never dream of contesting, but, instead, it is true of criticizing him for. In the accusation which I leveled -- with coarseness of "callow youth" -- the notion that it is useless to write a book about a director -- and without doubt, more in general, one about an auteur --whom one does not admire enough to be deliberately biased. That Marcel Carné does not know that copies of Nogent, Eldorado du dimanche are extant is of scarce importance, his metier not being to view his films for those who have to explain them to others. Still historians know criticism of witnesses distinguishes the intrinsic from the extrinsic. I will hold though that the error would be, in itself, of little importance had Jean Quéval avoided it by looking to find the first film of his auteur. It is true that having seen (I think) Le Jour se lève did not prevent him from having Jules Berry go out into the street to die (page 39). The fault is harmless, but one like that of a lover so "unbiased" as to brag about his mistress's beauty spot while being mistaken on her breasts.
Must I add that if Jean Quéval has been the only one in the press a few weeks before the filming of Thérèse Raquin began to beg Marcel Carné not to abandon film, maybe, proves, above all, in the end, that he is also the only one to believe what they tell him?

Yours, François Truffaut

from Arts April 29 - May 5 1959 as reprinted in The 400 Blows; a film by François Truffaut from a filmscript by François Truffaut and Michel Moussy. Edited by David Denby; Publisher Grove Hall (1969) page 225 (Helen R Lane is credited with the translation.)

Truffaut: I see only one common point among young filmmakers; all of them quite systematically play the pinball machine, unlike the old directors who prefer cards and whisky. This is not a paradox, because aside from this game, what I notice mostly is that there are essential differences between us. We know each other, of course, we like the same movies, we exchange ideas in a friendly way, but when the results of our work are judged on the screen, it is noticeable that Chabrol's films have nothing to do with Louis Malle's, which have nothing to do with mine.

English Films, French Critics Part II -- 1957

This is the second part of my study of the attitudes of French critics to English cinema in the 1950s. It follows for English Films, French Critics Nov '55 - Dec '56.

January 1957
Four English films were released in Paris for this issue - The Night My Number Came Up, The Green Man, It's Great to be Young and Richard III. Also, the magazine cited Run for the Sun, an Anglo-American production directed by Ray Boulting with the American films.
Only Richard III was considered by the conseil des dix. There it collected a total of 20 stars. Pierre Braunberger gave it 4 stars, while Jean-Pierre Vivet gave it 3 stars. Also, among Cahiers regulars, André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Pierre Kast gave the film 2 stars, while Eric Rohmer gave the film 1 star. Among the non-Cahiers panelists, Henri Agel, Jean de Baroncelli and Positif's Robert Benayoun all gave the film 2 stars. François Truffaut was the only abstention .

February 1957
There were no English films released in Paris reported for this issue.

March 1957
There were 3 films listed under English in the "films released in Paris" section this month - Cast a Dark Shadow, The Long Arm and The Man Who Never Was. Of these, only the Anglo-American production The Man Who Never Was was considered by the conseil des dix. It received a total of 3 stars - 2 from Georges Sadoul and 1 from Robert Benayoun. André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, François Truffaut and Eric Rohmer all bulleted the film as did Henri Agel, Jean de Baroncelli and Pierre Braunberger. Jacques Rivette provided the only abstention.

April 1957
A Town Like Alice, The Black Tent, Father's Doing Fine and The Stranger Came Home were all listed under "Films released in Paris - English" in this issue of Cahiers. Only A Town Like Alice received consideration from the conseil. Four panelists - Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Henri Agel, Georges Sadoul and Jean-Pierre Vivet - each gave it 1 star. Five - François Truffaut, Eric Rohmer plus Jean de Baroncelli, Pierre Braunberger and France Roche - bulleted the film. André Bazin abstained.

May 1957
No English films listed.

June 1957
Seven films appeared under the rubric "English" on the "films released in Paris" section for this month. The Battle of the River Plate, Meet Mr Callaghan, Private's Progress, Pennywhistle Blues, The Quartermass Experiment, Zarak and the Anglo-American production Saint Joan directed by Cahiers favorite Otto Preminger.
Only Saint Joan was considered by the conseil. It received 5 stars - 3 from Jacques Rivette and 1 each from George Sadoul and Henri Agel. François Truffaut and Eric Rohmer bulleted the film as did Jean de Baroncelli and France Roche. Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, J-P Vivet and Pierre Braunberger all abstained.
Jacques Rivette, Jean-Luc Godard, and Charles Bitsch all placed Saint Joan on "10 best films for 1957" lists published in January 1958.
François Truffaut placed the film Pennywhistle Blues on his "10 best films for 1957" list published in January 1958.
Additionally, the Anglo-American film Around the World in 80 Days directed by Michael Anderson was released in Paris for this issue. It garnered 12 stars from the conseil - 3 from France Roche, 2 from François Truffaut and also Henri Agel and Jean de Baroncelli, and 1 from Jacques Doniol-Valcroze as well as Pierre Braunberger and Georges Sadoul. J-P Vivet bulleted the film. Both Jacques Rivette and Eric Rohmer abstained.
In January 1958, "Robert Lachenay" listed Around the World in 80 Days in his "10 best films for 1957". Whether this is actually Robert Lachenay's list or an attempt by François Truffaut to provide two "10 best films for 1957" lists, I cannot confirm. Significantly, there is no overlap between Truffaut's list and Lachenay's.

July 1957
Interpol, Lost and Odongo were listed in the "films released in Paris - English" section. None got consideration from the conseil.

August-September 1957
Men of Sherwood Forest, Spin a Dark Web, Three Men in a Boat, True as a Turtle and The Iron Petticoat were the "films released in Paris" for this issue of Cahiers.
Three Men in a Boat received a lone star from France Roche. It was bulleted by Fereydoun Hoveyda and Jean-Luc Godard, plus Jean de Baroncelli and Henri Agel. While Charles Bitsch, Jacques Rivette, Eric Rohmer, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze plus Pierre Braunberger all abstained.
The Iron Petticoat - an English production which co-starred Katherine Hepburn and Bob Hope - received 2 stars - one each from France Roche and Henri Agel. It was bulleted by Eric Rohmer, Fereydoun Hoveyda, and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, as well as Jean de Baroncelli. The remainder of the panelists - Jean-Luc Godard, Jacques Rivette, Charles Bitsch plus Pierre Braunberger all abstained.

October 1957
"Films released in Paris - English" this month included The Baby and the Battleship, Brothers in Law and the Anglo-American production Seven Waves Away (American title - Abandon Ship!) was credited anong American films.
Neither The Baby and the Battleship nor Brothers in Law were considered by the conseil.
Seven Waves Away/Abandon Ship! received a total of 10 stars - 3 from Pierre Braunberger, 2 each from Charles Bitsch, Jacques Rivette and Jean-Luc Godard and 1 from Jacques Doniol-Valcroze. Positif's Robert Benayoun was the lone bullet. André Bazin and J-P Vivet, plus Henri Agel and Georges Sadoul all abstained.

November 1957
In this issue, Cahiers cited The Colditz Story, How to Murder a Rich Uncle, Reach for the Sky and Town on Trial as English films "released in Paris" in the previous month. Only How to Murder a Rich Uncle got any consideration from the conseil. It was given 2 stars by Henri Agel, and 1 each from Jean de Baroncelli and Robert Benayoun. J-P Vivet bulleted the film. André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Jacques Rivette and Eric Rohmer, plus Pierre Braunberger and Georges Sadoul all abstained.

December 1957
This issue listed The Steel Bayonet, Charlie Chaplin's A King in New York, and Laurence Olivier's The Prince and the Showgirl as English films "released in Paris".
The Chaplin film was awarded a total of 33 stars. Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Jacques Rivette, and Charles Bitsch from Cahiers, plus Pierre Braunberger and Georges Saduol gave the film 4 stars. André Bazin, plus Jean de Baroncelli and Robert Benayoun gave the film 3 stars. Henri Agel and J-P Vivet gave it 2 stars.
The Olivier film received 6 stars. 2 stars each from Jean de Baroncelli and J-P Vivet and 1 star each from Charles Bitsch and Robert Benayoun. Only Jacques Doniol-Valcroze bulleted the film. André Bazin and Jacques Rivette, plus Henri Agel, Pierre Braunberger, and Geroges Sadoul all abstained.
Four Cahiers regulars, Charles Bitsch, Jacques Rivette, Jean Domarchi and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze placed A King in New York 1st on their "10 best films" list for 1957. Other Cahiers regulars citing the film were Claude Chabrol, Jean-Luc Godard, Fereydoun Hoveyda, Luc Moullet and Françis Truffaut. Non-Cahiers staffers citing the film were Jean de Baroncelli, Pierre Braunberger and Georges Sadoul.

This series follows with English Films, French Critics 1958

English films, French critics Nov '55 - Dec '56

François Truffaut is noted for having written in Arts in May 1957, "The British cinema is made of dullness and reflects a submissive lifestyle, where enthusiasm, warmth, and zest are nipped in the bud. A film is a born loser just because it is English." I have wondered what were the exact films he was referring to, what did the other "young turk" critics think of these films, and what did the other critics at Cahiers and in Paris think of these films. In order to get some idea as to the answers to my questions, I have turned to two features of Cahiers; first, the "films released in Paris between x-date and y-date" feature which appeared at the back of each issue listing the films between those dates by country of origin, and second, the "conseil des dix" where panelists not only from Cahiers but also from other leading French newspapers and magazines posted their ratings of these films. One minor issue crops up and that is the problem of Anglo-American co-productions. I have elected to include all films categorized as "English" and also to include films by major English directors - e.g. David Lean, Carol Reed - listed under the rubric of "American"

November 1955
The Constant Husband and Trouble in the Glen were released in Paris for that month. Neither film attracted the attention of the conseil des dix.

December 1955
Simba was the only English film released in Paris that month. It was not considered by the conseil des dix.
David Lean's Summertime was also released in Paris that month but, not surprisingly, Cahiers classified it as an American film. It was considered by the conseil where five panelists gave the film a total of 7 stars and the other five bulleted it. François Truffaut and Jacques Rivette bulleted the film, as did non-Cahiers regulars, Ado Kyrou, Pierre Braunberger and Henri Agel. André Bazin and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze both gave the film 1 star as did non-Cahiers regular Georges Sadoul. Alain Resnais and Simone Dubreuilh gave the film 2 stars.

January 1956
Peter Glenville's The Prisoner was released in Paris that month but was not considered by the conseil.
Touch and Go was described on "films released in Paris" page as an "agreeable little English comedy", nevertheless, the film received only 1 star on the conseil, from Pierre Braunberger. François Truffaut, Ado Kyrou and Jean de Baroncelli all bulleted the film. Jacques Rivette, André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Pierre Kast and non-Cahiers regulars Henri Agel and Simone Dubreuilh all abstained..
The third English film released in Paris that month was The Deep Blue Sea based on a Terence Ratigan play which Cahiers called "dubious", while qualifying both Vivien Leigh's performance and Anatol Litvak's direction as "excellent". for all of that, The film received only 2 stars on the conseil des dix - 1 each from the only two panelists to consider it - Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Simon Dubreuilh Jacques Rivette, André Bazin, Pierre Kast and Jean-Pierre Vivet from Cahiers and Henri Agel, Jean de Baroncelli, Pierre Braunberger and Georges Sadoul all abstained.

February 1956
The only English film for that month released in Paris was That Lady. It was not considered by the conseil des dix.

March 1956
Three English films were released in Paris for this month. Only A Prize of Gold (directed by the American Mark Robson and starring Richard Widmark) was considered by the conseil des dix. It received 5 bullets - André Bazin and François Truffaut, plus Georges Sadoul, Simon Dubreuilh and Henri Agel. Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Pierre Kast, J-P Vivet and also Jean de Baroncelli and Pierre Braunberger all abstained.
Both Lilacs in the Spring and The Ladykillers were released in Paris but not considered by the conseil. Commenting on The Lady-killers on the "films released in Paris" page, Cahiers wrote, "Some people are mad for this kind of humor. They will be served. No relationship to Monsieur Verdoux."

April 1956
Abdulla the Great and The Dambusters were both released in Pairs for that month. The Dambusters did not come in for consideration by the conseil. Abdulla the Great received 3 stars on the conseil, 1 each from André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and non-Cahiers regular Simone Dubreuilh. Two non-Cahiers regulars bulleted the film - Armand Cauliez and Georges Sadoul. François Truffaut abstained as did J-P Vivet, Pierre Kast and non-Cahiers regulars Jean de Baroncelli and Pierre Braunberger.

May 1956
Not one of the three English films - Confession, You Know What Sailors Are and Doctor at Sea - released in Paris for that issue were considered by the conseil des dix.

June 1956
Five English films were released in Paris for the month. To Paris with Love, Tiger by the Tail, Above Us the Waves, Simon and Laura and Joe Macbeth.
Joe Macbeth and Simon and Laura were considered by the conseil des dix. There Joe Macbeth received a total of 4 stars - 2 from Pierre Braunberger and 1 each from Henri Agel and Simon Dubreuilh. Four Cahiers regulars - André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, François Truffaut and J-P Vivet - bulleted the film. Jean de Baroncelli, Pierre Kast and Georges Sadoul all abstained.
Simon and Laura received its only star from Simone Dubreuilh. Pierre Braunberger and Francois Truffaut both bulleted the film and the other seven panelists abstained.

July 1956
Three English - Break to Freedom, The Star of India and Mad about Men - films were released in Paris for this month. Only Mad about Men was considered by the conseil des dix. It was bulleted by François Truffaut, André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Eric Rohmer. The lone star it received was from Simone Dubreuilh. Jacques Rivette. Pierre Kast and also Henri Agel, Pierre Braunberger, and Georges Sadoul abstained

August-September 1956
The only English film listed in this issue of Cahiers was Is Your Honeymoon Really Necessary?; however, Cahiers classed Storm over the Nile as an American film. I can find nothing in the credits of that film to justify it being considered American. Neither film was considered by the conseil des dix.

October 1956
Two English films were released in Paris in that month. Oh Rosalinda and Loser take All. Neither film was considered by the conseil des dix. The comment for Oh Rosalinda on the "films released in Paris page" read, "For several lustrum, Powell and Pressburger each count on the other to insure the mise-en-scene of the films which each believe the other to have written the screenplay of. If they persist in making films, it is necessary to eat: a matter of life and death."

November 1956
Three English films were listed on the "films released in Paris" section, I Am a Camera, Escape Route and Value for the Money. Additionally, two films group with the American films - Trapeze (directed by Carol Reed) and The Cockleshell Heroes (directed by José Ferrer but with an all-English -except for José - cast) could also be considered English. Only Trapeze was considered by the conseil. It was bulleted by 6 panelists - François Truffaut, Eric Rohmer, Pierre Kast, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and J-P Vivet from Cahiers and Henri Agel. André Bazin, and also Jean de Baroncelli, Pierre Braunberger and Claude Mauriac all abstained.

December 1956
2 English films -Josephine and Men and Recoil - were listed on the films released in Paris page as English. Also, Terence Young's Safari was classed with the American films. None were considered by the conseil.

The series continues for the years -- 1957 -- 1958 -- 1959 -- 1960

Georges Sadoul on François Truffaut

from Le cinéma français by Georges Sadoul (Paris: Flammarion) 1962 (page 135, my translation)

Truffaut had been an aggressive critic, putting himself into position also questionable such as his admiration for the morose boulevardier Sacha Guitry.

Cahiers, the 'young turks' and William Wyler

The second issue of Eric Rohmer's La Gazette du cinema in June 1950 carried Jean-Luc Godard's first published piece as a film critic - a review of Joseph L Mankiewicz's Dragonwyck. In the fourth sentence of that review, Godard described Mankiewicz as "the most brilliant of American directors". On his way there - in the second sentence - he spoke of "characters from melodrama plagiarize themselves with (h)auteur and gesticulate with a solemnity equalled only on occasion by the severities of William Wyler". From the evidence of Godard on Godard, he did not mention Wyler until December of 1963 when in a thumbnail critique of the director Billy Wilder, he described Wilder as having "replaced Wyler and Zinneman in the hearts of exhibitors."

Contemporary critics seeking to find a divergence between Cahiers editor André Bazin and that magazines "young turks" generally point to their disagreement on the subject of the director William Wyler. Forthwith is some research into that disagreement.

From André Bazin's "William Wyler, or the Jansenist of Directing" (1948)

And yet, I do not think that it is more difficult to recognize the signature of Wyler in just a few shots than it is to recognize the signatures of Ford, Fritz Lang, or Hitchcock. I would even go so far as to say that the director of The Best Years of Our Lives is among those who have least often employed the tricks of the trade at the expense of genuine style. Whereas Capra, Ford, or Lang occasionally indulges in self-parody, Wyler never does so. Reprinted in Bazin at Work: Major Essays & Reviews from the Forties & Fifties By André Bazin, Bert Cardullo translated by Alain Piette, Bert Cardullo published 1997 Routledge (page 2)

Detective Story
Jacques Doniol-Valcroze wrote a short review of this film as part of the Cannes Festival coverage in the June 1952 issue of Cahiers du Cinema. This is quoted from that review. (page 17 my translation)

No one could suspect me of having a prejudice against filmed theater and I hold that William Wyler with The Little Foxes offered us its most exemplary expression until Les Parents terribles. However, I cannot state myself wholly satisfied with the fashion he has adapted Detective Story....Certainly, his unsurpassed knowledge of framing remains permitting him to follow with a stunning litheness and precision three or four simultaneous actions. It is too bad that they do not rate the movement...of the camera.

Carrie
Jacques Doniol-Valcroze short review of this film appeared in the "Notes on Other Films" section of the Cahiers du Cinema issue for June 1953. (page 55 my translation)
[Olivier's performance] and too much melodrama destabilize a film which disappoints deeply. Wyler's art as a metteur-en-scene is quite understood to be unimpaired and a few brilliant scenes make it lamentable that he committed himself to a subject scarcely for him.

Roman Holiday

Jacques Doniol-Valcroze's review appeared on page 60 of the April 1954 issue of Cahiers du Cinema. This is quoted, in part, (my translation).

Wyler whose Jezebel, The Best Years of Our Lives, and The Little Foxes, established him as a master began to disappoint from the second third of The Heiress. This disappointment was confirmed with Detective Story and Carrie, ruined by regrettable screenplays and made little for him. With Roman Holiday, he returns to the arena of our admiration with a discreet and sensible elegance.

Cahiers had not yet in 1954 instituted the conseil des dix.

François Truffaut wrote an unsigned review of Roman Holiday for the weekly Arts on April 7, 1954. Eugene Walz in François Truffaut a guide to references and resources published in 1982 summed up that review, thus; (note 620 page 177)

Roman Holidays [sic] is full of contradiction because William Wyler's talent resides "more in minutia, in precision, than in verve."

Truffaut would review only one other Wyler film, a revival of Wyler's 1938 film Jezebel.

Jezebel
Truffaut reviewed this film in the November 7, 1956 issue of Arts. Walz's summary of that review reads,

This Wyler film has gone out of date terribly. Truffaut dislikes Wyler for his false seriousness and false classicism.

The Desperate Hours
Not reviewed by Cahiers, The comment on the "Films released in Paris" page read

For two days, a peaceful family is terrorized by three escaped jailbirds. The lovers of "suspense" will be served.

That month, François Truffaut was the lone "young turk" on the conseil des dix. He bulleted the film, as did Pierre Kast. The film got 2 stars from both Jean de Baroncelli and Armand Cauliez, and 1 star from André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Georges Sadoul, J-P Vivet, Simon Dubreiulh and Pierre Braunberger.

William Wyler thumbnail critique (Special issue American Cinema Christmas 1955)
The thumbnail critiques in the Christmas special were credited as a whole to Charles Bitsch, Claude Chabrol, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, Jacques Rivette and François Truffaut. However, since this thumbnail pretty much reiterates Jacques Doniol-Valcroze's review of Roman Holiday, it would seem most likely it is his work. (page 63 my translation)
The immediate post-war made him the great hope of American cinema. after 1945, he appeared to impose himself as one of the "greats". The Little Foxes and The Best Years of Our Lives bore witness to the intelligence and sureness of his mise-en-scene. Two-thirds of the way through The Heiress, he began to disappoint us; Greg Toland was dead. we do not know much where Detective Story and Carrie strayed. With Roman Holiday, he resumed his success. This film had for him the little face of Audrey Hepburn and the artful currentness of its plot. It remains for him to prove that he is the great metteur-en-scene whom we hoisted to our shoulders ten years ago.

Friendly Persuasion
Reviewed by Jacques Doniol-Valcroze in the Aug/Sept 1957 issue of Cahiers. In part, he wrote,

A subject which could have been ambitious and treated with with nobility; but Wyler does not tackle it from the front. In order to pass off the lesson, he smothers it in the picturesque, the good-natured, drawn-out clowning and pushy chromolithography. It is boring and one has quite some time to remark that Dorothy McGuire is still a great actress and that Anthony Perkins will be, without a doubt, a very great young star.

In the conseil des dix, François Truffaut, Jacques Rivette, André Bazin and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze all bulleted the film. J-P Vivet also bulleted the film. Eric Rohmer gave it 1 star. Among non-Cahiers critics, only Georges Sadoul gave it as much as 2 stars. Henri Agel and France Roche gave it 1 star.

The Big Country
The film was not reviewed in Cahiers. The May 1959 issue carried this comment on "Films released in Paris" section. (page 61)

A western for those who dislike westerns, as always in Wyler, a bourgeois filmmaker who makes movies for those who dislike movies. So much diligence, care, effort at the service of a consistent baseness of inspiration. Credit sequence by Saul Bass.

5 "young turks" sat on the panel of that month's conseil des dix -- Jacques Rivette, Jean-Luc Godard, and Luc Moullet all bulleted the film. Eric Rohmer and Charles Bitsch abstained. The film received a total of 6 stars from the other 5 panelists, Pierre Braunberger and Georges Sadoul both gave the film 2 stars while Henri Agel and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze each awarded it 1 star.

Ben-Hur
The film was not reviewed in Cahiers. From the 1960 Cannes Film Festival, Jean Domarchi wrote, in part:

The only amusing moment (involuntary meanwhile) is the 180 degree reverse shot of Pontius Pilate who is washing his hands of the death of the righteous. And, conceivably, the appearance of Tiberius with an Oxford accent. all the rest is ugliness and silliness. Academically directed by Wyler with about as much conviction as Mankiewicz directing Guys and Dolls.

When the film was released in Paris, the blurb on the "films released in Paris" section read,

Remake of Fred Niblo's famous film drawn from the Lew Wallace novel. Viva Ford, gentlemen.

There were 4 "young turks" on the conseil des dix that month, Jean Douchet bulleted the film while Eric Rohmer, Jacques Rivette and André Labarthe all abstained. Among the non-Cahiers critics on that panel, the film got 6 stars -- half of that total coming from Le Monde's Jean de Baroncelli. The other 3 stars came one each from Georges Sadoul, Claude Mauriac, and Henri Agel. (apparently the film could not get a break on the Left, the Right or the Christian.) Paris-Presse's Michel Aubraint bulleted the film.

The Children's Hour
This film never turns up in the monthly "Films released in Paris" heading although it was considered by the conseil des dix in July 1962. On the odd side also, because, at Cahiers, at this time they seemed to have a Shirley MacLaine fetish. In that conseil, Louis Marcorelles gave the film 3 stars and Jean Domarchi gave it 1 star. Jacques Rivette bulleted the film while Jean Douchet abstained. Among non-Cahiers critics, only Michel Aubriant gave it as much as 1 star. Henri Agel, Jean-Louis Bory, and Pierre Marcabru all bulleted the film.

The Collector
In the July 1965 issue of Cahiers, Luc Moullet in his coverage of the that year's Cannes Film Festival wrote:

The Collector is an skillful film, but skill is a rather obsolete virtue - if it still is one - comparative to the evolution of cinema.

In October 1965, Jacques Bontemps reviewed the film in Cahiers, writing in part (page 69-72)

It would hardly be useful to undertake an analysis of The Collector, assuredly one of the best films from William Wyler, for the simple reason that this analysis has already been made, and magisterially, in 1948. In effect, the economy of means, the construction by sequences and of the sequence, the complete sacrifice to the psychological reduced to a single dramatic conflict, style without style, the primordial role of looks, clarity at the service of an efficacy which is granted some perambulations around the red dress of the red gown of Jezebel. (A dress which is substituted for by an orange sweater) are all characteristics that we find in the latest Wyler and which were observed by André Bazin in William Wyler...(see What is Cinema? Book 1) Those characteristics were in that epoque virtues. The advent of a new cinematic style seduces all those who witness some intelligence in the domain of cinema. But, for a long time, what could seem new has become anachronistic. Wyler's importance is no longer. Now, here, to our great surprise, he succeeds in seducing us stunningly.

In the conseil des dix, 3 Cahiers critics - Jacques Bontemps, Jean-Louis Comolli, and Michel Delahaye gave the film 2 stars and a fourth - Jean-André Fieschi gave it 1 star. Among non-Cahiers critics, Michel Aubraint (Candide), Jean-Louis Bory (Arts), Jean Collet (Telerama), Michel Cournot Nouvelle Observateur) and Georges Sadoul (Les Lettres Françaises) all gave the film 2 stars. Albert Cervoni (France Nouvelle) gave the film 1 star.

How to Steal a Million
In the October 1966 issue of Cahiers on page 72 for the "films released in Paris" section, Jacques Bontemps made this contribution,

In the era of [What's New] Pussycat, it is not the place to be mean with the Wyler of How to Steal a Million. But it must be said that the only visible films that he has signed are dramatic, and if his comedies are just like this, it goes against his grain. This is slow, ponderous and predictable. The worst boredom is assured; the one with neither highs nor lows, of a monotonous mediocrity.

In the conseil des dix, four Cahiers regulars - Jacques Bontemps, Jean-André Fieschi, Michel Delahaye and Michel Mardore - bulleted the film. Among the non-Cahiers critics, Albert Cervoni gave it 2 stars and Michel Aubriant, Jean de Baroncelli (LeMonde), Robert Benayoun (Positif), Jean-Louis Bory, and Georges Sadoul each gave it 1 star.

Funny Girl
In the February 1969 issue of Cahiers, Jean-Louis Comolli in the comment on the "Films released in Paris" section wrote in part (page64)

Starting with a paradox perhaps charming (a frankly ugly girl becomes a star of Zeigfeld's follies) it emerges into a shallow melodrama, the worst litany of conventions (loved by a gambler who loses, the "plain Jane" is torn between a love of the stage and love period and then finds herself repudiated by the unrepentant gambler). Barbra Streisand's performance, alas, amounts here to all the skill. Lousy musical numbers, rather abject music, unrefined weakness of the secondary roles. (and Omar Sharif is bored to death playing this character fabricated on measure to comfort homosexuals), catastrophic and academic illustration for direction... and again, let's speak of this "performance". It is on an order of monstrous. One goes to see Barbra as one goes to the zoo to admire the para-human savoir-faire of the most gifted chimpanzees, one applauds whole-heartedly at "Everything-this-little-one happens-to-do-in-spite-of..." Yes, Barbra knows how to sing, to laugh, to cry. That is close to everything. Not how to dance (hence, the skillfull parodic side of the musical numbers), nor how to act beyond a grimacing mimicry (hence, undoubtedly, the extreme academicism of situations). But she has to restore a well-seen handicap, the least tremble of her face (horsey) or her body (mis-shapen) seems colossal. One must have never seen musicla comedies such as My Fair Lady and West Side Story and be be completely unaware of Ruby Keeler, Cyd Charisse and Judy Holliday (not more ravishing, she also however...) to be marveled here by the shameful use that has been made of this ugliness.

Two months later, in rebuttal to this comment and one regarding a Lelouch film, Cahiers published a full review by Michel Delahaye of Funny Girl and Claude Lelouch's film , La Vie, l'amour, la mort (page 56 April 1969),

The question here is not one of attempting a rehabilitation or launching a polemic (this is not the place) but of introducing some observations starting from which one can (or cannot) put his/her judgment into perspective.

One can defend Barbra Streisand who carries the whole film, who in the first half fulfills totally her role of professional entertainer, and, in the second half, succeeds in making us swallow the leaden American-style Sharif which they have inflicted on us.

No conseil des dix. After 1968, Cahiers du Cinema discontinued the monthly conseil des dix until the 1980s.

A letter from F Hoda

About a year ago, while leafing through a issue of Positif from 1972 which was an index of that magazines first 20 years, I noticed that there were a few articles which were credited to one F. Hoda. Since one of the articles was on science fiction - a specialty of Fereydoun Hoveyda - I suspected that there had been a typo and this was actually Fereydoun Hoveyda who was a regular contributor to Cahiers du Cinema from the mid-50s to the mid-60s. Later on, I would find out that I was half right -- the articles were indeed the work of Hoveyda but under the pseudonym F Hoda.
The January 1958 issue of Cahiers included a broadside directed at Positif by François Truffaut Positif copie zero. This is a letter published in the March 1958 issue of Cahiers in which Hoveyda writing as F Hoda answers Truffaut.

Here, at the end, emanating from a Positif collaborator, this response to François Truffaut's article.[Positif, copie zero]

I have read your article on Positif with a kind of satisfaction. Not that I approve of all of the positions which you take. But, in taking by bashing your fond adversary, Kyrou, you unveil your ulterior motives. I like your impetuousness and your fashion, passionate and fierce, of defending cinema. Must you always invent imaginary monsters to illustrate your opinions?

It is not incumbent on me to defend Positif, since I do collaborate there only occasionally. But having had the honor of being cited in your article, I am passing on to you these few remarks. Your technique for "dismantling" Positif shows nothing new. The truncated citations (among them mine), the references to authors from ouside the world of cinema, etc. All this re-witnesses the pen of a polemicist. I do not begrudge you this method. Have the the Jesuit fathers taught both of us that one can allow oneself certain deviations AMDG ?

In identifying Positif with Kyrou, you appear to be assuming that Cahiers summarizes itself in you. Do you not at Cahiers make another monolithic bloc? "Compared to this bloc, Cahiers risks appearing without a definite line" facing "we others at Positif". You and your friends write, "Cahiers does not have the habit...", "for a longtime, we call on our vows...", "it is now a tradition for the crew at Cahiers...", etc. Positif over here, Cahiers over there. In order to ascertain the "unshaken" unity of your group, it is enough to take a quick look at the "council of ten", where your friends outrageously practice the politique, spoken of, as d'auteurs expressing views palpably identical.

A reading of any issue of Positif reveals the existence of small blocs of divergent opinions, quite like Cahiers. It is simple to return the serve. Cahiers alone has understood the significance of Land of the Pharaohs, Hot Blood, and The Wrong Man.
You can reproach Kyrou for his references to the would-be theory of amour fou. Yes, it is quite a poem. But do you believe that your allusions to the Bible or to Christian metaphysics are more amusing? I am happy that you are undertaking modern readings, such as Mythologies. But I regret that you are not more interested in a poet such as Malakovsky which would have spared you attributing to Ado Kyrou the phrase "la barque del'amour, etc.". I agree with you in standing against the anti-aestheticism of Kyrou and in exposing the intolerant tone which renders him, at once,
so simplistic and so virulent. But the same tone, a little closer to home, is found coming from the pens of your friends, "But, henceforth, there is film and film is Nicholas Ray..." "I am not afraid to compare..." etc.

What good, consequently, in continuing this game of rejoinders. However, before concluding my letter, I would like to return to Barthes who you seem to be fond of at this moment. I am not among his partisans. But that does not prevent me from citing this passage from his book. "Myths are nothing other than this incessant, untiring entreaty, this insidious exigency that makes all men recognize themselves in this eternal but nevertheless dated image which was constructed by them one day as if this was to be for all time." This being so, don't you think that you and your friends fabricate as many myths as Kyrou and his? You, yourself have become after a fashion a myth. It is enough, to verify it, to hear Leo Johannon or Delannoy speak on your subject.

We each have our eccentricities. Kyrou rewrites the rules of savoir-faire, agreeing or refusing to shake hands with directors. Seguin gives in physiology, measuring the interest of films around the hips and leg-length of actresses. Rohmer claims to find marble inside celluloid. Rivette sacrifices everything to the Jansenism of mise-en-scene. Chabrol conceives a passion for friends tempted by the devil. You bang the drum for the age and sincerity of auteurs. Bazin practices a kind of existential analysis. As for myself, I see Martians everywhere. On these diverse planes, do we not project ourselves outside of the moi and claim to be right? After all, why not?

(Cahiers du Cinema March 1958 page 61 my translation)

Some 16 months later for the July 1959 issue of Cahiers du Cinema that covered the 1959 Cannes Film Festival, Hoveyda would write the review of Les Quatres cents coups - a review which was published in an abridgment in Jean Douchet's recent coffee-table book French New Wave. Also, among the films which Hoveyda had reviewed for Positif was Hot Blood. In 1960, he would placed Nicholas Ray's Party Girl on his ten best films list.