
Henri Decaë
Camera
1915-07-31 - Present
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Henri Decaë (31 July 1915 – 7 March 1987) gained fame as a cinematographer entering the film industry as a sound engineer and sound editor. He was a photojournalist in the French army during World War II. After the war he began making documentary shorts, directing and photographing industrial and commercial films. In 1947 he made his first feature film.
Decaë is strongly associated with directors who strongly influenced, or were part of, the French New Wave. These include Jean-Pierre Melville, Louis Malle and Claude Chabrol. Decaë first worked as a cinematographer with Melville on Le Silence de la Mer (1949). Decaë also edited and mixed the sound. Although Decaë worked with Melville on Les enfants terribles, which as Williams commented (1992, p333) "...the work is more accurately to be viewed as a stunning demonstration of the cinematic possibilities of faithful literary adaptation in the hands of a gifted director", according to Marie (p 88) it was his distinctive camera work on Bob le flambeur which caught the attention of the Cahiers critics. Malle hired him for his first two features and Chabrol for his first three features. They had been lucky as Decaë was finding it hard to get work at that time as he was being informally shunned by many after participating in a critical film about the Korean War. By the time Decaë worked for François Truffaut on The 400 Blows he came with a reputation, which meant that he was the highest-paid person on the film.
Decaë's liking for natural light, his ability to work at speed as well as his excellent photographic sensibility led to him working with René Clément on several features beginning with Plein soleil (1960). It was Decaë "...who liberated the camera, from its fixed tripod. He made the New Wave possible, backing up Melville, Malle, Chabrol and Truffaut." (Marie, 2003 p 89)
Credits

Le Samouraï

The 400 Blows

Purple Noon

Elevator to the Gallows

The Professional

The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob

The Night of the Generals

Delusions of Grandeur

The Light at the Edge of the World

The Black Tulip

The Boys from Brazil

Le Cercle Rouge

The Sucker

The Sicilian Clan

The Seven Deadly Sins

Inspector Blunder

The Silence of the Sea

Viva Maria!

Exposed

Weekend at Dunkirk

Bob le Flambeur

The Wild Goose Chase

Joy House

Castle Keep

Léon Morin, Priest

An Almost Perfect Affair

The Vengeance of the Winged Serpent

Cop or Hood

The Lovers

Don Juan or If Don Juan Were a Woman

Eva

Joe: The Busybody

Bobby Deerfield

The Island

The Cousins

Sundays and Cybele

Witness in the City

Death of a Corrupt Man

Le Guignolo

Sweet and Sour

À double tour

The Thief of Paris

The Comedians

Diabolically Yours

The Good Girls

Circle of Love

The Strange Ones

Handsome Serge

The Hard Way

I'm Losing My Temper

Magnet of Doom

A Very Private Affair

Umbrella Coup

The Joy of Living

The Only Game in Town

Hotel Paradiso

My Other Husband

The Day and the Hour

Lust

These Sorcerers Are Mad

Hello-Goodbye

The Right to Love

Heart of the Casbah

Two People

S.O.S. Noronha

La Paresse

D-Day Revisited

Pride

Heartbreak Ridge
Faits d'hiver