Claude Nollier

Biography

An excellent actress, Claude Nollier remains too little known. Maybe because she made few films, but isn't quality better than quantity ? Whatever the truth, none of her appearances, whether an important movie like John Huston's Moulin Rouge (1952) or an artistic flop such as Les trafiquants de la mer (1947), leaves a normal viewer indifferent. Hieratically beautiful and terribly cold, Claude Nollier is most often chilling, invariably attracting resentment from the other characters in the movie in return. Fitting this type of role to perfection she is memorable as the murderess whose distant airs play against her in André Cayatte's court drama Justice Is Done (1950); as Olga, the communist party envoy who must decide the life or death of the hero in Dirty Hands (1951); as Fernandel's malevolent sister-in-law in Le printemps, l'automne et l'amour (1955); and, among others, as the governess driven by her latent lesbianism in Lewis Gilbert's cruel and sensitive Loss of Innocence (1961). Of course, as every rule has its exception, she had no difficulty in portraying Toulouse-Lautrec's adored (and adorable ?) mother in the already mentioned Moulin Rouge (1952). More active on the boards than on the big and the small screen, Claude Nollier's movie career should nevertheless not be overlooked as it is now. She is a great performer to rediscover.