Orphée

Director: Jean Cocteau

Length:   France 1950 (95mins)

Cocteau’s magic retelling of the Orpheus myth turns the lyre -playing singer of Greek legend into a famous left bank poet in post-war Paris. Fallen out of favour and lost for poetic inspiration, Orphée becomes obsessed with a mysterious black-clad princess who first claims the life of a rival poet, and then Eurydice, his wife. With its unforgettable imagery- the dissolving mirror through which characters pass into the next world, death-dealing motorcyclists, and Cocteau’s magical special effects, Orphée is a work of haunting beauty that follows the poetic logic of a dream.

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