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Robert Hossein

Robert Hossein

Actor · 1927 – 2020 · Paris, France

Robert Hossein was a French film actor of Parsi origin, director and writer. He directed the 1982 adaption of Les Misérables, and appeared in Vice and Virtue, Le Casse, Les Uns et les Autres and Venus Beauty Institute. His most recent roles include starring as Michèle Mercier's husband in the Angélique series and as a Catholic priest who falls in love with Claude Jade and becomes a communist in Prêtres interdits (Forbidden Priests) in 1973. Hossein started directing films in 1956 with Les salauds vont en enfer from a story by Frédéric Dard whose novels and plays went on to furnish Hossein with much of his later film material. Right from the start Hossein established his characteristic trademarks: using a seemingly straightforward suspense plot and subverting its conventions (sometimes to the extent of a complete disregard of the traditional demand for a final twist or revelation) in order to concentrate on ritualistic relationships. This is the director's running preoccupation which is always stressed in his films by an extraordinary command of film space and often striking frame compositions where the geometry of human figures and set design is used to accentuate the psychological set-up of the scene. The mechanisms of guilt and the way it destroys relationships is another recurring theme, presumably influenced by Hossein's lifelong interest in the works of Dostoyevski. Although Hossein had some modest international successes with films like Toi, le venin and Le vampire de Dusseldorf, he was much singled out for scorching criticism by the critics and followers of the New Wave for the unashamedly melodramatic frameworks of his films. The fact that he was essentially an auteur director with a consistent set of themes and an extraordinary mastery of original and unusual approaches to staging his stories, was never appreciated. He was not averse to trying his hand at widely different genres and was never defeated, making the strikingly different spaghetti western Une corde, un Colt and the low-budgeted but daringly subversive period drama J'ai tué Raspoutine. However, because of the lack of wider success and continuing adverse criticism, Hossein virtually ended his film directing career in 1970, having concentrated on theatre where his achievements were never questioned, and subsequently returning to film directing only twice. With two or three exceptions, his films remain commercially unavailable and very difficult to see. He is the son of André Hossein a Zoroastrian French composer of Azerbaijani-Tajik descent, and a Jewish comedy actress from Kiev. He was married three times: first to Marina Vlady (he has two sons with her, Pierre and Igor), later to Caroline Eliacheff (with whom he has a son, Nicholas). He is currently married to actress Candice Patou, with whom he has one son, Julien. According to an article written by Emannuel Peze, Hossein experienced a conversion to Catholicism in 1971 during a visit to the Marian apparition at San Damiano in Lombardo Italy. Description above from the Wikipedia article Robert Hossein, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Movies23

  • Movie8.3

    C'era una volta il West

    Once Upon a Time in the West

    1968 · 5.1K votes

  • Movie7.2

    Le Professionnel

    The Professional

    1981 · 611 votes

  • Movie6.5

    Angélique et le Roy

    Angelique and the King

    1966 · 142 votes

  • Movie6.7

    Angélique, marquise des anges

    Angelique

    1964 · 192 votes

  • Movie6.0

    Prêtres interdits

    1973 · 3 votes

  • Movie7.8

    Du rififi chez les hommes

    Rififi

    1955 · 656 votes

  • Movie6.4

    Angélique et le Sultan

    Angelique and the Sultan

    1968 · 124 votes

  • Movie6.9

    Les uns et les autres

    Bolero

    1981 · 88 votes

  • Movie6.9

    Le Casse

    The Burglars

    1971 · 135 votes

  • Movie7.0

    Parajanov. Verjin kolazh

    Parajanov, the Last Collage

    1995 · 1 votes

  • Movie6.5

    Indomptable Angélique

    Untamable Angelique

    1967 · 117 votes

  • Movie5.8

    Madame Sans-Gêne

    Madame

    1961 · 18 votes

  • Movie5.9

    Vénus beauté (institut)

    Venus Beauty Institute

    1999 · 140 votes

  • Movie4.8

    La Fabuleuse Aventure de Marco Polo

    Marco the Magnificent

    1965 · 12 votes

  • Movie5.8

    Un homme et son chien

    A Man and His Dog

    2009 · 26 votes

  • Movie5.7

    M.D.C. - Maschera di cera

    The Wax Mask

    1997 · 61 votes

  • Movie5.8

    Le Repos du guerrier

    Love on a Pillow

    1962 · 40 votes

  • Movie6.0

    The Dirty Game

    1965 · 11 votes

  • Movie4.6

    Don Juan ou si Don Juan était une femme...

    Don Juan or If Don Juan Were a Woman

    1973 · 38 votes

  • Movie7.7

    Belmondo, itinéraire...

    2011 · 12 votes

  • Movie5.9

    Un homme et une femme, 20 ans déjà

    A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later

    1986 · 34 votes

  • Movie6.3

    Une corde, un Colt...

    Cemetery without Crosses

    1969 · 78 votes

  • Movie5.8

    Le Meurtrier

    Enough Rope

    1963 · 10 votes

Series18

  • TV5.7

    Sacrée soirée

    1987 · 5 votes

  • TV6.8

    Champs-Elysées

    1982 · 9 votes

  • TV3.6

    Vivement dimanche

    1998 · 9 votes

  • TV8.5

    Apostrophes

    1975 · 4 votes

  • TV9.5

    Spécial cinéma

    1974 · 2 votes

  • TV8.0

    Le Grand Échiquier

    1972 · 3 votes

  • TV6.0

    Midi trente

    1972 · 1 votes

  • TV6.1

    Nulle part ailleurs

    1987 · 8 votes

  • TV6.0

    Samedi soir

    1971 · 1 votes

  • TV8.7

    Cinépanorama

    1956 · 3 votes

  • TV7.4

    Les Petits Meurtres d'Agatha Christie

    The Little Murders of Agatha Christie

    2009 · 56 votes

  • TV6.2

    Stars 90

    1990 · 2 votes

  • TV5.0

    Téléthon

    1987 · 1 votes

  • TV5.0

    Reflets de Cannes

    1954 · 2 votes

  • TV8.0

    Nouvelles d'Henry James

    Henry James Stories

    1976 · 1 votes

  • TV7.7
  • TV9.3

    Le Juge

    2005 · 3 votes

  • TV6.2

    Le Gorille

    1990 · 6 votes