Geneviève Bujold Movies

With her warm, intelligent performances and piercing almond eyes, the French-Canadian actress Genevieve Bujold cut a striking figure throughout the international film community during the 1960s and beyond. Born July 1, 1942, in Montréal, Quebec, Bujold studied acting at the Montréal Conservatoire d'Art Dramatique but exited prior to graduation in order to join a touring company's production of The Barber of Seville. She subsequently enlisted with another performing company, Rideau Vert, and also began appearing on television. Her film debut was in 1962's Amanita Pestilens, followed in 1964 by La Fleur de l'Age. In 1965, the Rideau Vert troupe traveled to Moscow and Paris, where Bujold came to the attention of filmmaker Alain Resnais. He cast her in 1966's La Guerre est Finie, where her turn as a pro-Spanish activist earned international attention. She remained in France to star in Philippe de Broca's cult hit Le Roi de Coeur, then appeared opposite Jean-Paul Belmondo in Louis Malle's 1967 effort Le Voleur. Upon returning to Canada, Bujold appeared in 1967's Entre la Mer et L'eau Douce. The following year, she starred in Isabel, winning Best Actress honors at the Toronto Film Festival as well as marrying the picture's director, Paul Almond.
Bujold then traveled to Britain to star as Anne Boleyn in Anne of the Thousand Days, a performance which won her an Academy Award nomination and made her a star. A three-picture deal with Universal followed, but she first detoured back to Canada to star in Almond's 1970 film Act of the Heart. Universal then cast her as the titular Mary Queen of Scots, but, fearing typecasting, Bujold refused the role, resulting in a lawsuit from the studio. Instead of paying damages, she returned to Europe to co-star in The Trojan Women, which failed to measure up to box-office expectations. Almond's Journey and Claud Jutra's 1973 feature Kamouraska further derailed her career, and after appearing opposite Alec Guinness in Caesar and Anthony for British television she journeyed to Hollywood, where as part of her Universal pact the studio pointed her to 1974's disaster epic Earthquake. After again starring with Belmondo in de Broca's L'Incorrigible, Bujold made 1976's Swashbuckler to appease Universal. Brian DePalma's Vertigo homage Obsession resuscitated her career, although the follow-up, John Korty's Alex and the Gypsy, was a disappointment.
In 1978, Bujold starred in Michael Crichton's Coma, one of her biggest hits to date. After starring alongside Clint Eastwood in 1984's Tightrope, Bujold teamed with director Alan Rudolph on the superb romantic comedy Choose Me. In Rudolph, she found a director unusually sympathetic to her style of performing, and she subsequently appeared under him in 1985's Trouble in Mind and 1988's The Moderns, delivering some of her strongest work to date. David Cronenberg's stunning Dead Ringers followed, but the 1990s proved a disappointment as Bujold appeared in a series of lackluster Canadian productions which rarely appeared anywhere outside of their land of origin. She also made headlines for exiting a starring role in the TV series Star Trek: Voyager just prior to production. In 1997, after a long absence, Bujold finally returned to American cinema in the independent hit The House of Yes. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
1968  
 
Written and directed by Paul Almont, Isabel takes place in a Canadian coastal village. Genevieve Bujold, who must hold the patent for Enigmatic Young Women, plays a girl whose flawlessly beautiful face masks the maelstrom swirling in her mind. Isabel is haunted by the images of her family members, each of whom suffered a violent death. Believing herself the product of an incestuous relationship, Isabel enters into an affair with a young man who resembles her own brother. Marc Strange, who plays Bujold's paramour, also wrote the songs heard on the soundtrack of Isabel. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Marc StrangeGerard Parkes, (more)
1967  
 
Louis Malle directed this light comedy about crime and class in the City of Light. Georges Randal (Jean-Paul Belmondo) is a young man living in Paris at the turn of the century who is due to inherit a considerable fortune. However, his uncle, who is acting as his guardian, manages to spend Georges' money before he ever gets a chance to see it. Georges is also deeply in love with Charlotte (Geneviève Bujold), his cousin, and wants to marry her; however, the same uncle has promised her hand to another, a man Charlotte does not love. Understandably angry, Georges makes plans to steal the family's jewelry, intended for Charlotte, away from his dishonest uncle. Georges soon discovers that he enjoys being a thief, and begins robbing the wealthy as protest against the bourgeoisie. However, as Georges' ill-gotten nest egg grows, he finds himself becoming a member of the idle rich he professes to despise. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Jean-Paul BelmondoGeneviève Bujold, (more)
1967  
 
A young man (Claude Gauthier) sets out from his hometown of Quebec and travels to Montreal to seek his fortune. He takes a succession of odd jobs before hitting it big as a singer. He has eyes for a waitress (Genevieve Bujold) in a greasy spoon diner before his crooning career takes him to hang out in more upscale restaurants. The young man falls for another girl who leaves him, and he is just as lonely as he was in his small town in Quebec before he found success. All the money in the world won't bring back his girl in this independent feature with the backdrop of burgeoning speeches of Quebec declaring independence from the rest of Canada. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Geneviève BujoldClaude Gauthier, (more)
1966  
 
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La Guerre est Finie represents one of the few "linear" films of French director Alain Resnais. Instead of indulging in his beloved flashbacks and flashforwards, Resnais sticks to a logical progression of events in relating this jaundiced tale of political activism. Yves Montand plays a tired, ageing revolutionary whose current target is Spain's Franco regime. Having become a familiar face to the authorities, Montand is no longer of any value as an undercover operative, yet he insists on leading a strike in Madrid. He is stopped from doing so by his fellow revolutionaries, who feel that Montand has become out of synch with the Movement. When Montand is finally able to complete his mission, everything goes wrong. Among the hero's "fellow" activists are Genevieve Bujold and Ingrid Thulin, both of whom harbor a romantic interest in Montand. The casual viewer might be surprised at the lack of action in the film, but favoring suspense over action is typical of Alain Resnais. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Yves MontandIngrid Thulin, (more)
1966  
 
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The French/Italian/British King of Hearts (Le Roi de Coeur) takes place during World War I, but it might as well have been the Vietnamese conflict so far as its youthful "core" audience was concerned. Overacting outrageously, Adolfo Celi plays British colonel Alexander MacBibenbrook, who orders mild-mannered Scotsman Pvt. Charles Plumpick (Alan Bates) to undertake a life-or-death mission in a tiny French village. While evacuating the town, the Germans have left behind a time bomb that will explode at midnight; Plumpick must defuse that bomb. Upon his arrival in town, Plumpick discovers that it is far from deserted. A group of inmates from the local insane asylum, left behind during the evacuation, have claimed the village for their own. Knocked unconscious, Plumpick awakens to learn that he has been crowned "King of Hearts" by the gentle lunatics. None of the inmates pay any heed to Plumpick's warnings about impending doom, and when he attempts to lead them out of town, they are terrified at the prospect and scurry back to the "safety" of the village. Plumpick is finally able to render the bomb useless, whereupon the grateful inmates decide to stage a three-year celebration. When Plumpick tries to leave, he is kidnapped by the loonies at the behest of beautiful inmate Coquelicot (Geneviève Bujold), who has fallen in love with him. Bound and gagged, Plumpick watches helplessly as the Germans and the British troops kill each other off in comic-opera fashion. Finally set free, Plumpick weighs the horrible insanity of war against the more benign brand of lunacy represented by the inmates. The final image -- of a nude Plumpick carrying a birdcage, knocking on the doors of the asylum, and demanding that he be "accepted" -- was reproduced for the print ads of King of Hearts, effectively giving away the ending. An essential "date" film of the 1970s, King of Hearts was often released to campus movie houses in tandem with a pair of cult-favorite short subjects, the animated Bambi Meets Godzilla and Lenny Bruce's Thank You Masked Man. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Alan BatesGeneviève Bujold, (more)
1964  
 
Filmed in French, the Canadian Adolescents consists of three short tales of the trials and tribulations of teenhood. In "Fiametta", Micaela Esdra moons over her deceased father, whose omniprescent memory squelches her mother's latest romance. "Genevieve" features Genevieve Bujold and Louise Marleau as close friends who drift apart after handsome Bernard Arcand honors Bujold with a kiss. And in "Marie-France and Veronica", Veronice Duval and Nadine Ballot simultaneously experience a sexual awakening while visiting Paris. Though three directors worked on The Adolescents, the film maintains a consistency of mood and quality throughout. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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1963  
 
A man neglects his wife and daughter in favor of his passion for gardening in this quirky drama from director Rene Bonniere. He is appalled to find a poisonous mushroom one day on his well-manicured lawn, and in spite of his considerable efforts, his lawn is soon filled with the deadly fungi. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Geneviève Bujold

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