Paris Belongs to Us

Paris Belongs to Us
Film poster
Directed byJacques Rivette
Written byJean Gruault
Jacques Rivette
Produced byClaude Chabrol
Roland Nonin
StarringBetty Schneider
Giani Esposito
Françoise Prévost
CinematographyCharles L. Bitsch
Edited byDenise de Casabianca
Music byPhilippe Arthuys
Release date
  • 13 December 1961 (1961-12-13)
Running time
141 minutes
CountryFrance
LanguageFrench

Paris Belongs to Us (French: Paris nous appartient, sometimes translated as Paris Is Ours) is a 1961 French mystery film directed by Jacques Rivette in his feature-length directorial debut. Set in Paris in 1957 and often referencing Shakespeare's play Pericles, the title is highly ironic[according to whom?] because the characters are immigrants or alienated and do not feel that they belong at all.[citation needed]

The story centres on young university student Anne who, through her older brother, meets a group of people haunted by mysterious tensions and fears and the deaths of two of its members. The source of the malaise affecting the group is never explained, leaving viewers to wonder how far it might be an amalgam of individual imbalances, general existentialist anxiety, or the paranoia of the Cold War as the world faced the possibility of nuclear annihilation.[1][2][3]

  1. ^ Turner Classic Movies, retrieved 12 February 2018
  2. ^ Bradshaw, Peter (13 April 2006), The Guardian, retrieved 12 February 2018
  3. ^ The New Yorker, retrieved 12 February 2018