Maria Schneider Movies
Driven out of show business with sticks of butter following the premiere of Bernardo Bertolucci's taboo-shattering Last Tango in Paris in 1972, Maria Schneider seemed destined for the kind of whatever-happened-to obscurity normally associated with failed child television stars and mid-career burnouts. Heroin-addicted and disheartened, she disappeared for a short while, but came back soon thereafter, and has appeared in more than 30 films since. Born March 27, 1952, in Paris, Schneider made her film debut in Jean-Pierre Blanc's La Vieille Fille in 1971, though true notoriety came the next year with her role as Marlon Brando's young lover in Last Tango in Paris. Daughter of actor Daniel Gélin (Is Paris Burning? [1966]), Schneider was originally cast in the role of Conchita in Luis Buñuel's final film, That Obscure Object of Desire (1977), but was fired shortly into filming and replaced with two actresses (Ángela Molina and Carole Bouquet). Schneider has also appeared in Franco Zeffirelli's Jane Eyre (1996) and as herself in Les Acteurs (2000). ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide- 1977
Set in the 19th century, and based on the classic Swiss novel Die Richterin by C. F. Meyer, this film tells a story of ghosts, incest and murder in a mountain village. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lucia Bosé, Lou Castel, (more)
The mutual admiration between actor Jack Nicholson and director Michelangelo Antonioni resulted in the psychological drama The Passenger. Nicholson plays David Locke, a disillusioned American reporter who is sent on a grueling mission to North Africa. When he stumbles across the body of a dead man, Locke, long desirous of starting life over again, assumes the corpse's identity. He soon discovers that the man he's pretending to be is involved in gun running on behalf of a terrorist group. Making the acquaintance of a mysterious woman (Maria Schneider), he finds a kindred spirit -- a woman as "lost" as he. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jack Nicholson, Maria Schneider, (more)
- 1975
Maria Schneider is Michele, a young student sculptress assigned to look after the kidnapped baby of her ex-lover. She and the kid hit it off but are unable to escape until the kidnappers begin to kill one another off. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Maria Schneider, Sydne Rome, (more)
- 1972
Muriel (Annie Giradot) is a shy woman who bluffs and blusters around in order to hide her shyness and to protect her loneliness, even though she longs wistfully for a companion of some sort. She has been lonely so long that now she is an old maid and has never been wooed. In this gentle French film, Muriel gets a glimpse of romance when Gabriel (Philippe Noiret) walks into the seaside hotel she is vacationing in. His car has broken down, and he has to stay there for a few days while it is repaired. Hers is the only dinner table with room at it, and Gabriel cannot prevent himself from charming women. She is stiff with him at first, but soon they develop a friendship. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Annie Girardot, Philippe Noiret, (more)
In Bernardo Bertolucci's art-house classic, Marlon Brando delivers one of his characteristically idiosyncratic performances as Paul, a middle-aged American in "emotional exile" who comes to Paris when his estranged wife commits suicide. Chancing to meet young Frenchwoman Jeanne (Maria Schneider), Paul enters into a sadomasochistic, carnal relationship with her, indirectly attacking the hypocrisy all around him through his raw, outrageous sexual behavior. Paul also hopes to purge himself of his own feelings of guilt, brilliantly (and profanely) articulated in a largely ad-libbed monologue at his wife's coffin. If the sexual content in Last Tango is uncomfortably explicit (once seen, the infamous "butter scene" is never forgotten), the combination of Brando's acting, Bertolucci's direction, Vittorio Storaro's cinematography, and Gato Barbieri's music is unbeatable, creating one of the classic European art movies of the 1970s, albeit one that is not for all viewers. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Marlon Brando, Maria Schneider, (more)
