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Michel Ciment

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Michel Ciment
Ciment in 2010
Born(1938-05-26)26 May 1938
Paris, France
Died13 November 2023(2023-11-13) (aged 85)
Paris, France
EducationLycée Louis-Le-Grand
Lycée Condorcet
Sorbonne
Amherst College
Occupations
ChildrenGilles Ciment [fr]

Michel Ciment (French: [simɑ̃]; 26 May 1938 – 13 November 2023) was a French film critic and the editor of the cinema magazine Positif.

Ciment was born in Paris on 26 May 1938, the son of Alexander and Hélène Cziment.[a] His father, a Hungarian Jew, had settled in the French capital in the 1920s and narrowly escaped the Vel' d'Hiv Roundup in 1942, fleeing to Normandy where he was later joined by his son. Ciment's French mother was also Jewish, but kept this fact hidden until just before her death.[2][3] He attended the Lycée Condorcet, then enrolled in a Classe préparatoire aux grandes écoles at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, where he was influenced by the teaching of philospher Gilles Deleuze. In 1958–59, he was a Fulbright scholar at Amherst College in the United States, where he gained a knowledge of American history.[4][5][6]

Ciment was noted for his love for American film, somewhat unusual in his French cultural environment. He credited his Americophilia to his memories of the liberation of Paris by American soldiers in 1944, when he was a child.[2]

Although Ciment had written about cinema in a student publication,[7] his first film review (of The Trial [8]) was published in Positif magazine in 1963, and he later became the periodical's chief editor.[9] In 1972, Cimemt became a film critic on the radio programme Le Masque et la Plume, to which he contributed until a few weeks before he died.[10][11] He wrote books on great film directors, which were based on extensive interviews with their subjects. An anthology of interviews, Film World, was published in English 2009.[2]

Ciment was a Chevalier of the Order of Merit, Knight of the Legion of Honour, Officer in the Order of Arts and Letters, and the president of FIPRESCI. He died in Paris on 13 November 2023, aged 85.[12] Paying tribute to his friend, John Boorman described Ciment as "an original", commenting: "To say that Michel was passionate about the cinema was to do him an injustice. He lived and ate and dreamed cinema."[13]

Approach to film criticism

Ciment regarded cinema as a synthesis of all the arts, stating that he could not imagine being a film critic without a knowledge of theatre, literature, painting, and music. He preferred to know as little as possible about a film when viewing it for the first time, and avoided reading press releases in advance.[1]

Favorite films

Ciment participated in the 2012 Sight & Sound critics' poll, where he listed his ten favorite films as follows: 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Earrings of Madame de..., Fellini's Casanova, Persona, Providence, The Rules of the Game, Salvatore Giuliano, Sansho the Bailiff, Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, and Trouble in Paradise.[14]

Publications

  • Ciment, Michel (1973). Kazan on Kazan. Cinema One. London: Viking / British Film Institute. ISBN 0436099381.
  • Ciment, Michel (1976). Le dossier Rosi: cinéma et politique (in French). Paris: Stock. ISBN 2234005167.
  • Ciment, Michel (1980). Kubrick. Translated by Adair, Gilbert. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. ISBN 0030616875.
  • Ciment, Michel (1985). Boorman: un visionnaire en son temps (in French). Paris: Calmann-Lévy. ISBN 2702113486.
  • Ciment, Michel (1985). Conversations with Losey. London: Methuen. ISBN 0416404707.
  • Ciment, Michel & Tierchant, Hélène (1989). Theo Angelopoulos. Filmo (in French). Vol. 21. Paris: Edilig. ISBN 2856012086.
  • Ciment, Michel (1992). Le Crime à l'écran: Une histoire de l'Amérique. Découvertes Gallimard Cinéma (in French). Vol. 139. Paris: Gallimard. ISBN 978-2070531950.
  • Passeport pour Hollywood : entretiens avec Wilder, Huston, Mankiewicz, Polanski, Forman & Wenders, (1992)
  • Ciment, Michel (2001). Kubrick: The Definitive Edition. Translated by Adair, Gilbert & Bononno, Robert. New York: Faber & Faber. ISBN 0571199860.
  • Fritz Lang : le meurtre et la loi, coll. "Découvertes Gallimard" (n° 442), Paris: Gallimard (2003)
  • Ciment, Michel (2003). Petite planète cinématographique (in French). Paris: Stock. ISBN 978-2234055278.
  • Ciment, Michel (2009). Film World: Interviews with Cinema's Leading Directors. Oxford: Berg Publishers. ISBN 978-1845204570.
  • Ciment, Michel (2015). Les conquérants d'un nouveau monde: Essais sur le cinéma hollywoodien [Conquerers of a New World: Essays on Hollywood Cinema] (in French) (Revised ed.). Paris: Gallimard. ISBN 978-2070461622.
  • Ciment, Michel (2019). Une vie de cinéma (in French). Paris: Gallimard. ISBN 978-2072799679.
  • Ciment, Michel (2023). Jane Campion on Jane Campion. New York: Abrams. ISBN 979-8887070032.

Film festival juror

Honours and distinctions

Notes

  1. ^ Ciment's father changed his last name after World War II, when he became a naturalised French citizen.[1]

References

  1. ^ a b Adler, Laure (1 March 2019). "Michel Ciment, critique: "Le cinéma n'est pas fait pour être vu sur un portable"" [Michel Ciment, critic: "Cinema wasn't made to be viewed on a mobile phone"]. France Inter (in French). Paris. Archived from the original on 13 November 2023. Retrieved 7 November 2024.
  2. ^ a b c Nossiter, Adam (15 December 2023). "Michel Ciment, Eminent French Film Critic, Is Dead at 85". The New York Times. Retrieved 15 December 2023.
  3. ^ Le Fanu, Mark (Winter 2023–24). "Michel Ciment". Sight and Sound. Vol. 34, no. 1. London. p. 33.
  4. ^ Gombeaud, Adrien (14 November 2023). "Michel Ciment (1938-2023): le cinéma au-dessus de tout". Les Echos (in French). Paris. Archived from the original on 15 November 2023. Retrieved 5 November 2024.
  5. ^ Kaganski, Serge & Lalanne, Jean-Marc (14 November 2023) [25 October 2014]. "Michel Ciment: "Aujourd'hui il est de bon ton d'aimer plein de défauts"". Les Inrockuptibles (in French). Paris. Retrieved 7 November 2024.
  6. ^ Winock, Michel (May 2012). "Michel Ciment, ou l'esprit « Positif »". L'Histoire (in French). No. 375. Paris. pp. 20–21. Retrieved 7 November 2024.
  7. ^ Kenny, Glenn (2 February 2009). "Interview: Michel Ciment on "Mavericks and Outsiders: 'Positif' Celebrates American Cinema"". MUBI. London. Retrieved 6 November 2023.
  8. ^ Hakem, Tewfik (22 May 2023). "Michel Ciment, une vie en ciné-textes: 1. Naissance d'une passion". À voix nue (in French). Paris. France Culture. Retrieved 9 November 2024.
  9. ^ Douhaire, Samuel (14 November 2023). "Le critique de cinéma Michel Ciment, pilier de "Positif" et du "Masque et la plume", est mort". Télérama (in French). Paris. Retrieved 6 November 2023.
  10. ^ Garcin, Jérôme & Garcia, Daniel (2005). Le Masque et la Plume (in French). Paris: Éditions des Arènes. pp. 82, 134. ISBN 978-2912485939.
  11. ^ Lair, Noémie (13 November 2023). "Le critique de cinéma Michel Ciment, figure du "Masque et la plume", est mort". France Inter (in French). Paris. Archived from the original on 13 November 2023. Retrieved 5 November 2024.
  12. ^ Goodfellow, Melanie (13 November 2023). "Michel Ciment Dies: French Film Critic & Historian Was 85". Deadline. Retrieved 13 November 2023.
  13. ^ Boorman, John (14 November 2023). "Sir John Boorman pays tribute to Michel Ciment (1938-2023)". Film Stories. Halesowen. Archived from the original on 14 November 2023. Retrieved 8 November 2024.
  14. ^ "Michel Ciment | BFI". Archived from the original on 18 August 2016.
  15. ^ "Berlinale 1976: Juries". berlinale.de. Retrieved 14 July 2010.
  16. ^ "Décret du 31 décembre 2001 portant promotion et nomination". Journal officiel de la République française. Paris. 1 January 2002. NOR: PREX0105272D. Retrieved 8 November 2024.
  17. ^ "Légion d'honneur". Le Monde. Paris. 3 January 2002. Retrieved 8 November 2024.
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