Henri Verneuil. Director with Armenian roots

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

French film director of Armenian origin Henri Verneuil, who lived his whole life outside his homeland, devoted forty-seven years of his life to working in cinema, which he perceived as an interesting adventure.

Thanks to cinema, the director met many "stars" of France, America, Italy and other countries. His films were nominated for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival and for the American Oscar. Finally, in 1996, he received the César award - the best in Europe.

Biography

An Armenian who lived all his life in France, Henri Verneuil was born on October 15, 1920 in the city of Rodost, located in Turkey. The real name of the director is Ashot Malakyan. Like many Armenians, in 1924 his family fled from their settled place to Greece, and from there they were going to settle in Mexico. However, fate brought them to Marseille, where they lived until they moved to Paris. The name of this street and this house will later be included in the title of his latest film.

The boy was ten years old when his parents settled in the capital of France. Wanting their son to get a better education, the father and mother of the future film director, in addition to his studies at the Lycée Ecouen-Provence, hired a private teacher of Armenianlanguage so that the son does not forget the language of his ancestors.

Working as a journalist

Henri Verneuil undoubtedly received a higher education, but there is no exact data on this, it is only known that he worked as a journalist for the newspaper La Marseillaise.

In 1945, after the victory over fascism, when the whole world rejoiced and was concerned about world peace, Ashot Malakyan was offered to write articles about the Armenian issue. A young journalist interested in this issue wrote the whole truth about the Armenian Genocide of 1915, and the articles received a warm response.

Only at the age of 28, Henri Verneuil realized what he wanted to do all his life - to make movies. Being a humanitarian, Verneuil got a job as an assistant to director Robert Verneuil, who shot the film The Count of Monte Cristo, which thundered in those years, with Jean Marais in the title role. As a grateful student, Ashot, or, as he was called in France, Henri (he did not stop writing articles), he borrowed the director's surname and since then signed his works with this surname.

Henri Verneuil Movies

The young director will shoot his first documentary dedicated to his beloved Marcel in 1948. Then he will become the director of thirty short films and documentaries about the city of childhood. And in three years, the director and journalist will write the first script for the film "The Table for the Dead" - an adaptation of Marcel Aimé's novel.

Plucking up courage, Henri will show the script to popular French comedian Fernandel. He will like the script so much that he wants to star in the film.

In a word, readythe film was immediately shown at the Cannes Film Festival - and the name of Henri Verneuil, the nationality of whose owner was immediately evident, became famous, and many Hollywood producers entered into contracts with him. It was a success.

For the film "The Sheep with Five Legs", filmed in 1954, the American Film Academy awarded Henri Verneuil as the best original screenwriter. The name of the Armenian screenwriter and director began to be put next to such names as Francois Truffaut, Jean Renoir, Rene Clair and many other prominent figures in world cinema.

Who did the director work with

Such famous actors as Alain Delon, Jean Gabin, Jean-Paul Belmondo, Fernandel, Yves Montand, Anthony Quinn, Omar Sharif, Claudia Cardinale and other actors worked with director Verneuil.

Verneuil filmed French comedies, adventures, detective stories. It was he who saw in the then young Alain Delone and Jean-Paul Belmondo brutal characters, although before that they played in intellectual films.

Revolver in the hands of Delon and Belmondo was first put by Henri Verneuil. Many people remember the films famous in the seventies and eighties with the participation of these charismatic actors, for example, Melody from the Cellar, The Sicilian Clan, The President and other films, and together with Delon, the director often shot Jean Gabin.

Calling Gabin either a "rude animal" or a "cat of prey", the director will shoot the famous film "The Adventurers" with Jean Gabin and Jean-Paul Belmondo in the lead roles.

Awards at home

The director was married twice, Henri Verneuil's children from his first marriage named Patrick and Sophie, and fromthe second - Sevan and Gayane.

For an indefinite time, Verneuil will disappear from public view, visit his homeland, Armenia, and the Catholicos of All Armenians Vazgen the First himself will award him with the Order of Gregory the Illuminator of the first degree. He had many orders and titles throughout his life, but he considered helping his homeland to be his main business.

From childhood, the director sang the chants of Komitas in the Armenian church, knew his native language perfectly and always tried to speak it on occasion.

Films "Mayrik" and "588 Rue Paradis"

In 1991, Henri Troyatt, also an Armenian by nationality, invites Verneuil to make a film about an Armenian family that survived persecution and genocide, and thus Verneuil realizes his secret dream.

Finally, the film "Mayrik" (Henri Verneuil), which means "mother (mommy)" is dedicated to his family and the Armenian people. The film starred Claudia Cardinale, Omar Sheriff and other actors. Using the example of his family and his memories, Verneuil shows the life of emigrants, the difficulties they had to endure and their unity.

Another film, which became the last in the director's life, is 588 Rue Paradis.

This is also an autobiographical film, which is a continuation of "Mayrik", which tells about the fate of a boy (Henri Verneuil himself), who became a director. The film is watched in one breath.

Conclusion

The director died in 2002, at the age of 82, without having received an award for the film "Mayrik" in his homeland. Premieretook place in 2010 at the 7th Golden Apricot Film Festival in Yerevan. For the father, the prize was given to the son, Patrick Malakyan, who took the historical surname of Armenian ancestors.