BRIGITTE BARDOT BOOKSHELF
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Brigitte Bardot (born September 28, 1934) is a former French model, actress and singer from a bourgeois background who became an international sex symbol. Discovered by Roger Vadim at age 14, she went on to become France's biggest star and the symbol for a new breed of free 1960s femininity and sexuality. She helped to popularize French cinema, the bikini, free love and St Tropez. Since retiring from acting in the early 1970s she has devoted herself to animal rights and is the founder and chair of The Brigitte Bardot Foundation for the welfare and protection of animals.
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actress Brigitte Bardot
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Brigitte Bardot was born in Paris into a middle class, strictly catholic background. She showed an early interest in music and dance, and at the age of 15, with her mother’s encouragement, she began studying at the Paris Conservatory for Music and Dance.
In May 1949, Bardot appeared on the cover of Elle magazine, and was noticed by Roger Vadim, then an assistant film director. Vadim became infatuated with Bardot and encouraged her to start working as a film actress. Over the following years he become both her mentor and her lover.
Bardot’s film career began with Jean Boyer’s 1952 film Le Trou normand. The same year, at the age of 18, she married Roger Vadim. From 1952 to 1956 she appeared in small parts in seventeen, mostly forgettable films. However, her modelling and an appearance at the Cannes Film Festival in 1953, kept her in the public eye. “She is every man’s idea of the girl he’d like to meet in Paris,” wrote the film-critic Ivon Addams in 1955.
It wasn’t until she appeared in Et Dieu... crea la femme directed by Vadim, in a role he created especially to showcase her talents, that Bardot achieved international celebrity. The film was a big success on both sides of the Atlantic, and earned Bardot the label of sex goddess.
Bardot became a hot property and over the next few years was cast in some high profile films including Autant-Lara’s En Cas de malheur, Cluzot’s La Verite and Louis Malle’s Vie privee. She also starred in Jean-Luc Godard’s critically acclaimed Le Mepris, considered by many critics to be her best performance.
Off-screen Bardot’s private life was the focus of constant media attention. She had an affair with Jean-Louis Trintignant, her co-star on Et Dieu... crea la femme, and divorced Jean Vadim in 1957. In 1958, the Los Angeles Times reported on the front page that Bardot was recovering in Italy from a reported nervous breakdown. A suicide attempt with sleeping pills two days earlier was denied by her public relations manager.
In 1959, she married actor Jacques Charrier, by whom she had her only son, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier (born 1960). Bardot wasn’t comfortable with the role of mother however, and after she and Charrier divorced in 1962, Nicolas was raised in the Charrier family and did not maintain close contact with Bardot until his adulthood.
In addition to her acting career, Bardot became a pop singer in the 1960’s. She recorded many popular songs mostly in collaboration with Serge Gainsbourg, Bob Zagury and Sacha Distel, including Harley Davidson, Bubble gum, On Demenage, Tu Veux, Ou Tu Veux Pas? and the notorious Je t’aime... moi non plus.
In 1973, a few months before her fortieth birthday, Brigitte Bardot announced her retirement from show business, choosing instead to put her energies into her work as an animal rights activist. In 1986, she sold her properties to establish the Brigitte Bardot Foundation, a non-profit organization that works for animal rights throughout the world.
with New Wave Directors |
Complete Filmography |
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| FILMS WITH NEW WAVE DIRECTORS |
French Title |
English Title |
Year |
Director |
Role |
| Et Dieu… créa la femme |
And God Created Woman |
1956 |
Roger Vadim |
Juliete Hardy |
| Les bijoutiers du clair de lune |
Heaven Fell That Night |
1957 |
Roger Vadim |
Ursula |
| Vie privée |
A Very Private Affair |
1961 |
Louis Malle |
Jill |
| Le repos du guerrier |
Warrior's Rest / Love on a Pillow |
1962 |
Roger Vadim |
Genevieve Le Theil |
| Le Mépris |
Contempt |
1963 |
Jean-Luc Godard |
Camille Javal |
| Paparazzi (documentary) |
[n/a] |
1963 |
Jacques Rozier |
herself |
| Viva Maria! |
[n/a] |
1965 |
Louis Malle |
Maria I |
| Masculin-Feminin |
Masculine-Feminine |
1965 |
Jean-Luc Godard |
Elle-même |
| Histoires extraordinaires |
Spirits of the Dead / Tales of Mystery |
1968 |
Louis Malle |
Giuseppina |
| Don Juan 73 |
If Don Juan Were A Woman |
1973 |
Roger Vadim |
Irene Cartis |
FILM (year) ... ROLE
Le Trou normand (1952) ... Javotte Lemoine
Manina, la fille sans voile (1952) ... Manina
Les Dents longues (1952) ... Marriage witness
Un acte d'amour (1953) ... Mimi
Le Portrait de son père (1953) ... Domino
Tradita (1954) ... Anna
Si Versailles m'était conté (1954) ... Mademoiselle de Rozille
Futures vedettes (1955) ... Sophie
Le Fils de Caroline chérie (1955) ... Pilar d’Aranda
Doctor at Sea (1955) ... Helene Colbert
Les Grandes manoeuvres (1955) ... Lucie
Mio figlio Nerone (1956) ... Poppea
La lumière d'en face (1956) ... Olivia Marceau
La Mariée est trop belle (1956) ... Chouchou
En effeuillant la marguerite (1956) ... Agnes Dumont
Helen of Troy (1956) ... Andraste
Et Dieu… créa la femme (1956) ... Juliete Hardy
Les Bijoutiers du clair de lune (1957) ... Ursula
Une parisienne (1957) ... Brigitte Laurier
La femme et le pantin (1958) ... Eva Marchand
En cas de malheur (1958) ... Yvette Maudet
La testament d'Orphee (1959) ... brief appearance
Babette s'en va-t-en guerre (1959) ... Babette
Voulez-vous danser avec moi? (1959) ... Virginie Dandieu
L'Affaire d'une nuit (1960) ... Woman in restuarant
La Vérité (1960) ... Dominique Marceau
Vie privée (1961) ... Jill
Les Amours célèbres (1961) ... Agnes Bernauer
La Bride sur le cou (1961) ... Sophie
Le Repos du guerrier (1962) ... Genevieve Le Theil
Le Mépris (1963) ... Camille Javal
Paparazzi (documentary, 1963) ... herself
Une ravissante idiote (1964) ... Penelope Lightfeather
Marie Soleil (1965) ... Cameo
Viva María! (1965) ... Maria
Masculin, féminin (1966) ... Elle-meme
À coeur joie (1967) ... Cecile
Histoires extraordinaires (1968) ... Giuseppina
Shalako (1968) ... Countess Iina Lazaar
L'Ours et la poupée (1969) ... Felicia
Les Femmes (1969) ... Clara
Les Novices (1970) ... Agnes
Les Pétroleuses (1971) ... Louise
Boulevard du rhum (1971) .Linda Larue
Don Juan 73 (1973) ... Jeanne
Colinot (1973) ... Arabelle
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