French filmmaker Bertrand Blier, who scored hits with transgressive comedies featuring Gerard Depardieu and Isabelle Huppert such as Going Places and Get Out Your Handkerchiefs, has died. He was 85.
Blier died on Monday night at his home in Paris surrounded by his wife and children.
Born in 1939 in the Paris suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt, Blier was the son of actor Bernard Blier and grew up was steeped in film and theatre.
He made his directing debut with cinema-verité documentary Hitler-Never Heard of Him in 1963 which earned critical kudos.
Going Places
“Going Places,” which was released in 1974, involved two brutal young men who drift about France in stolen cars and harass and assault women, steal, and commit murder. The film gave Depardieu his big break and established Blier as one of France’s most subversive comedic voices. Originally released as “The Waltzers” in the U.S., the film, also starring Isabelle Huppert in one of earliest roles, was a major hit on the arthouse circuit.
In 1980, Blier won a Cesar, France’s top film nod, for “Buffet Froid” (“Cold Cuts”), a dark absurdist satire in which he directed his father alongside Depardieu.
Blier’s other standout works comprise “Menage” (1986); “Too Beautiful For You” (1989), for which he won the Cannes Film Festival Grand Jury Prize for Best Director; “Mon Homme” (1996) and “The Clink of Ice” in 2010.
Blier’s final film was “Convoi exceptionnel” in 2019, starring Depardieu and Christian Clavier.
