Jean-Claude Brisseau

The Black Angel

Stephane, the wife of a prominent magistrate, shoots and kills a man in her home and claims he tried to rape her. While investigating her case, her lawyer becomes hopelessly enmeshed in a web of lies and subterfuges concerning her past.

The Girl from Nowhere

Michel, a retired math teacher, has lived alone since his wife’s death and occupies his time writing an essay about the beliefs that shape daily life. One day he comes across Dora, a young homeless woman, who shows up injured on his doorstep, and puts her up until she recovers. Her presence brings something new to Michel’s life, but gradually the apartment becomes the site of mysterious happenings.

Shadows

The life of an ordinary working class family in Bagnolet's block of council flats, Paris' suburb. "I've spent 17 years here. I sacrificed myself for you. Now it's over. " says the mother, who dreams of being a singer. Between a pre-teen rocker brother and a disillusioned father, daughter Nathalie brings balance into this breaking-down family.

Le cinéma selon Brisseau

Director Jean-Claude Brisseau discusses the making of his film Les anges exterminateurs (2006) in an interview.

Tempting Devils

A woman discovers curious erotic messages on a lost cell phone in the train. When she meets the owner of the phone, a liberated young woman, the two of them embark on an erotic journey.

Four Adventures of Reinette and Mirabelle

Two young girls meet, Reinette from the countryside and Mirabelle from Paris, and decide to take a flat together in Paris where they attend University. Four successive stories about their daily lives illustrate the very different views, characters and relation to the world of these two friends.

Brisseau, 251 rue Marcadet

Jean-Claude Brisseau receives a film crew and some friends at his home to talk about cinema, childhood, time passing by…

Médiumnité

A young woman unsatisfied with her life and her marriage discovers gifts of medium.

The Afternoon of a Bored Young Man

Paris, Latin Quarter, May 1968. Images of barricades and police movements in the street. In his bedroom, on his bed, a young man indulges in daydreams that invade the whole space.

Death in the Afternoon

A man stabbed to death is haunted by his memories and fantasies while dying alone.

On Sunday Afternoon

A voice, warm and heartbreaking, that of Brisseau himself, coils over black and white images. The tone was set very quickly: "To wake up is to be born again in the world of despair." 'On Sunday afternoon' is a film all at once clinical and theoretical on melancholy in the strong sense of the famous "black bile" of the Greeks whose author seems to want to make a complete turn, from his tragic dimension to his psychological dimension, even ending his film with a long quote from Freud's 'Mourning and Melancholia'.

A Brutal Game

A strict father imposes impossible guidelines on his disabled daughter which reflect his secret and tortured life.

La Croisée des chemins

The peregrinations of a group of boys and girls from Paris. Two girls swap the capital for the countryside near Montpellier. One of the girls hesitates between dream world and reality.La croisée des chemins marks the start of a significant oeuvre and is a film in which reality and dream are mixed. Jean-Claude Brisseau shot this film on Super8 in 1975. Screened in Studio 43 in Paris, the film was noticed and admired by Eric Rohmer, who attached the name of his production company Les Films du Losange to several films by Brisseau: Un jeu brutal, De bruit et de fureur en Noce blanche.