Léon la lune (English: Leon the Moon) is a 1956 French short documentary film directed by Alain Jessua. The film won the Prix Jean Vigo in 1957. The film documents an old drifter in Paris in the poetic realist style.[1]

Léon la lune
Directed byAlain Jessua
Written byRobert Giraud and Alain Jessua
Produced byA.J. Films
StarringLéon la Lune
CinematographyWladimir Ivanov
Music byHenri Crolla and André Hodeir
Release date
  • 1956 (1956)
Running time
16 minutes
CountryFrance
LanguageFrench

Jessua was inspired by Jean-Paul Clébert's book Paris Insolite[2] (1952) and decided to make a film about a clochard[3] or tramp. The poet and novelist Robert Giraud, an expert on the Parisian underworld, introduced Jessua to Léon la Lune, a vagrant whose real name was Leon Boudeville, and suggested that they follow him from day to night. After completing the film Giraud showed it to the poet and screenwriter Jacques Prévert who wrote an introduction and asked Henri Crolla to contribute some music to the film.

Léon la lune also appeared in the series Clochards by Robert Doisneau, the pioneer of humanist photojournalism.[4]

Cast

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  • Léon la Lune aka Leon Boudeville

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "MoMA | Black Girl and Leo the Moon". www.moma.org. Archived from the original on 2010-11-18.
  2. ^ "Jean-Paul Clébert – HILOBROW".
  3. ^ Page 128, Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices edited by Stuart Hall
  4. ^ "Atelier Robert Doisneau | Galeries virtuelles des photographies de Doisneau - Clochards".
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