''Night at the Crossroads'' (french: La Nuit du carrefour) is a 1932 French film by Jean Renoir, based on the novel of the same title (known in English as '' Maigret at the Crossroads'') by

Georges Simenon Georges Joseph Christian Simenon (; 13 February 1903 – 4 September 1989) was a Belgian writer. He published nearly 500 novels and numerous short works, and was the creator of the fictional detective Jules Maigret. Early life and education ...

and starring Renoir's brother Pierre Renoir as Simenon's popular detective, Inspector Maigret. The French director Jacques Becker, then apprentice to Renoir, worked as assistant director and

production manager In the cinema of the United States, a unit production manager (UPM) is the Directors Guild of America–approved title for the top below-the-line staff position, responsible for the administration of a feature film or television production. Non- ...

on the film.

Reputation and influence

Often cited as being Jean Renoir's least well-known

sound film A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed before ...

, ''Night at the Crossroads'' has nonetheless maintained a very strong critical reputation. In an article republished as part of

André Bazin André Bazin (; 18 April 1918 – 11 November 1958) was a renowned and influential French film critic and film theorist. Bazin started to write about film in 1943 and was a co-founder of the renowned film magazine ''Cahiers du cinéma'' in 1951, ...

's book on Renoir, the French New Wave critic and filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard described it as being ''"Renoir's most mysterious film"'' and ''"the only great French detective movie--in fact, the greatest of all adventure movies."'' Bazin, André, Jean Renoir (1992), Da Capo Press, p. 231, At a symposium on the Hungarian filmmaker

Béla Tarr Béla Tarr (born 21 July 1955) is a Hungarian filmmaker. Debuting with the film ''Family Nest'' (1977), Tarr began his directorial career with a brief period of what he refers to as "social cinema", aimed at telling everyday stories about ordin ...

held at Facets Multimedia on 16 September 2007, American

film critic Film criticism is the analysis and evaluation of films and the film medium. In general, film criticism can be divided into two categories: journalistic criticism that appears regularly in newspapers, magazines and other popular mass-media outl ...

Jonathan Rosenbaum Jonathan Rosenbaum (born February 27, 1943) is an American film critic and author. Rosenbaum was the head film critic for ''The Chicago Reader'' from 1987 to 2008, when he retired. He has published and edited numerous books about cinema and has ...

mentioned that Tarr's then-new feature, '' The Man from London'' (also based on a novel by Georges Simenon), was influenced by ''Night at the Crossroads''. Rosenbaum, Jonathan. Discussion. Facets Multimedia. Symposium: Béla Tarr. Facets Cinematheque, Chicago, Illinois. 16 September 2007.

References

External links

* * 1932 films 1932 crime drama films French crime drama films Police detective films Maigret films Films directed by Jean Renoir French black-and-white films 1930s French-language films 1930s police procedural films 1930s Dutch-language films 1932 multilingual films French multilingual films 1930s French films {{1930s-crime-drama-film-stub