Un enfant dans la foule

A Child in the Crowd

Director: Gérard Blain
Country: France

1976 | 85 min. | French
Subtitles: German, English

Cast_ César Chauveau, Claude Cernay, Annie Kovaks Screenplay_ Gérard Blain, Michel Pérez Camera_ Emmanuel Machuel Producer_ Gérard Blain, Claude Berri Rights_ Paul Blain

Drawing from his own experiences, Gérard Blain tells of growing up in occupied France. A forgotten masterpiece of French cinema.

When he started out as an actor in the early films of François Truffaut and Claude Chabrol, Gérard Blain was considered the "French James Dean". In 1970 he began directing his own films. His third work, Un enfant dans la foule, made in 1976, is set in France during the Second World War. The young Paul is on his own. His parents are absent, along with all ordinary aspects of everyday life. In occupied Paris, he meets German soldiers, for whom he procures cigarettes before joining the Resistance. Blain shows us a harsh world. One, however, where time and again tender moments of compassion arise. This strongly autobiographical film, directed with poetic sobriety, is Blain's masterpiece and a rediscovery of the retrospective.

Director

Gérard Blain begins his career as an actor. His first directorial work, Les Amis, won the Golden Leopard in Locarno in 1971. His second feature, Le Pélican, was shown in 1974 in the competition of the Berlinale, and Un enfant dans la foule screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 1976. In 2000 his last film,Ainsi soit-ils, again won the main prize in Locarno.