Mauvaise Graine

Mauvaise Graine
Promotional release poster
Directed byBilly Wilder
Alexander Esway
Written byBilly Wilder
Jan Lustig [de]
Max Colpet
Claude-André Puget
Produced byEdouard Corniglion-Molonier
Georges Bernier
StarringDanielle Darrieux
CinematographyPaul Cotteret
Maurice Delattre
Edited byTherese Sautereau
Music byFranz Waxman
Allan Gray
Production
company
Compagnie Nouvelle Commerciale
Distributed byPathé Consortium Cinéma
Release date
  • 1934 (1934)
Running time
77 minutes[1]
CountryFrance
LanguageFrench

Mauvaise Graine (English: Bad Seed) is a 1934 French action comedy directed by Billy Wilder (in his directorial debut) and Alexander Esway. The screenplay by Wilder, Jan Lustig [de], Max Colpet, and Claude-André Puget focuses on a wealthy young playboy who becomes involved with a gang of car thieves.[2][3]

Although Wilder and Esway shared the directing credit, in later years leading lady Danielle Darrieux recalled Esway had been involved with the project in some capacity but clearly remembered she had never seen him on the set.[4] It was remade in Britain in 1936 as the film The First Offence starring John Mills and Lilli Palmer. It was later remade in France as the 1950 film The Unexpected Voyager.

  1. ^ "Mauvaise graine". 11 December 2006.
  2. ^ "MAUVAISE GRAINE (1934)". BFI. Archived from the original on October 17, 2017.
  3. ^ "Mauvaise Graine (1934) - Alexander Esway, Billy Wilder | Synopsis, Characteristics, Moods, Themes and Related | AllMovie" – via www.allmovie.com.
  4. ^ Chandler, Charlotte, Nobody's Perfect: Billy Wilder, A Personal Biography. New York: Simon & Schuster 2002. ISBN 0-7432-1709-8, pp. 60-68