'Tin Drum' screenwriter dies at 89
February 9, 2021
French screenwriter and author Jean-Claude Carriere, who wrote some of the most iconic movies of the past half century, has died on Monday at his home in Paris at the age of 89, his daughter told AFP.
Having won a first Oscar for best short film in 1963, the prolific writer gained international renown through his collaboration with surrealist Spanish filmmaker Luis Bunuel. Belle de Jour (1967), a provocative work starring Catherine Deneuve as a high-class prostitute, shocked audiences with its sadomasochist scenes.
Carriere and Bunuel's work together includes other memorable films, such as The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) and The Obscure Object of Desire (1977).
The screenwriter also co-wrote with German filmmaker Volker Schlöndorff the adaptation of The Tin Drum (1979), based on the novel by Nobel Prize laureate Günter Grass. The film won Cannes Palme d'Or and the Academy Award for best foreign language film.
Another Oscar nomination came for his screenplay of The Unbearable Lightness of Being, based on the novel by Milan Kundera, written together with director Philip Kaufman.
The 1990 comedy-drama Cyrano de Bergerac, with Gerard Depardieu in the title role, is another one of Carriere's best known adaptions of a literary classic. His screenplay for a previous work starring Depardieu, The Return of Martin Guerre, had won a French Cesar in 1983.
Other renowned directors who worked with Carriere include Milos Forman, Jean-Luc Godard, Louis Malle, Michael Haneke and Andrzej Wajda.
In a career spanning six decades, Carriere collected over 150 screen credits, penning works up until his death.
His most recent screenplays include At Eternity's Gate, the 2018 biopic by Julian Schnabel about painter Vincent van Gogh, as well as The Salt of Tears, a film directed by Philippe Garrel that premiered at the Berlinale competition in 2020.
The screenwriter was also recognized with an Honorary Oscar in 2014.
Beyond his film work, Carriere also wrote various books, including The Power of Buddhism (1999) with the Dalai Lama and This is Not the End of the Book with Umberto Eco, which came out in English in 2012.
His collaboration with English theater director Peter Brook on the stage version of The Mahabharata is also legendary: The ancient Sanskrit epic was turned into a nine-hour play that was first performed at the Avignon festival in 1985.