the voice speaks

I could dedicate a whole blog to the allure and genius of Catherine Deneuve, but I will limit my gushing affection to the first of many entries. I can't really articulate what it is about Deneuve that makes her so unique and so special other than her obvious looks, but I always find myself so enraptured by her screen presence. You can watch her face for hours and not feel short changed or guilty. She's isn't a sex bomb in a grotesque way nor is she is a waif. She isn't a cold Hitchcockian blonde nor is she a girl-woman blow up doll of a blonde. She is her own woman and own star that manages to imbue her characters with empathy and a classic appeal. Her visage is especially important in her early work in Roman Polanski's "Repulsion", Jacques Demy's "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg", and Luis Bunuel's "Belle De Jour". Those films she is trapped and punished by her beauty, but somehow she is never the simpering victim. What does this have to do with anything? An NPR interview that allowed her to purr into my earphones.

I urge you to listen to this incredible interview on NPR with Deneuve in which she talks about her career, her family, and wearing perfume in the countryside. Listening to her voice so closely makes you want her to take a drag from her cigarette and say something really French and naughty in your ear.

And this is one of my favorite Deneuve moments from "Repulsion." It's a deeply internal psychological film that doesn't treat Deneuve with heaps of dialogue, but rather a chance to show her range as an actress and watch a woman on the verge of a breakdown. Her genteel beauty is as stunning as her ascent in madness.


She is the definition of French cool.