"Actor: Jean Marie Robain"

• Les Enfants Terribles | DVD | (30/08/2004) from £14.75   |  Saving you £5.24 (35.53%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Jean-Pierre Melville's second film, made in 1950, became a significant influence among French film-makers and earned Melville renown as a maverick who could do wonderful things outside his country's studio system. (Melville's independence was a forerunner of that enjoyed later in the decade by New Wave figures such as François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard.) Les Enfants Terribles is based on a 1929 novel by poet and film-maker Jean Cocteau, who also wrote the script with Melville and according to some people interfered in everything from the casting (the rather stiff male lead was a Cocteau protégé) to the photography. Nevertheless, the story of a sister (an outstanding performance by Nicole Stephane) and brother (Edouard Dhermite) who withdraw into their own, insulated world to play out suggestively erotic dramas, has a fluid, lyrical movement that is part of a visionary whole. In some ways a harbinger of the coming pop narcissism of youth culture, Les Enfants Terribles is also a timeless tale of mythic exploration of existence and purpose. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com

• Le Silence de la mer | Blu Ray | (23/01/2012) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Le Silence De La Mer - Jean-Pierre Melville's debut film - is an adaptation of the novella of the same title by celebrated French Resistance author Vercors (the pen name of Jean Bruller). Clandestinely written in 1942 during the Nazi occupation of France and furtively distributed, it captured the spirit of the moment, and quickly became a staple of the Resistance.Melville's cinematic adaptation - partly shot in Vercors' own house - tells the story of a German officer, Werner von Ebrennac (Howard Vernon), who is billeted to the house of an elderly man (Jean-Marie Robain) and his niece (Nicole Stphane) in occupied France.One of the most important French films to deal with World War II, and a landmark in Melville's distinguished oeuvre, Le Silence De La Mer is a lyrical, timeless depiction of the experiences and struggles of occupation and resistance.

• Le Silence de la mer (Masters of Cinema) | DVD | (25/06/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Le Silence De La Mer - Jean-Pierre Melville's debut film - is an adaptation of the novella of the same title by celebrated French Resistance author Vercors (the pen name of Jean Bruller). Clandestinely written in 1942 during the Nazi occupation of France and furtively distributed it captured the spirit of the moment and quickly became a staple of the Resistance. Melville's cinematic adaptation - partly shot in Vercors' own house - tells the story of a German officer Werner von Ebrennac (Howard Vernon) who is billeted to the house of an elderly man (Jean-Marie Robain) and his niece (Nicole Stphane) in occupied France. Resisting the intruder the uncle and niece refuse to speak to the German officer who warms himself by the fire each evening espousing idealistic views about the relationship between France and Germany. These propagandised illusions are shattered however when a trip to Paris reveals the truth of what is really going on. One of the most important French films to deal with World War II and a landmark in Melville's distinguished oeuvre Le Silence de la mer is a lyrical timeless depiction of the experiences and struggles of occupation and resistance. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Melville's debut film for the first time on home video or DVD in the UK.