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Henri Diamant-Berger
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Henri Diamant-Berger (June 9, 1895 - May 7, 1972) was a French screenwriter, film director and producer.
Born in Paris, France to a Jewish family, he studied to be a lawyer but was drawn to the motion picture business. He began his career in the cinema in 1916 as a silent film screenwriter but within a few years was behind the camera, directing. In addition to writing screenplays, during the period of 1916 to 1919 he also published and edited a film magazine and books about the movies. Hired by Pathé, in 1918 he was sent to Fort Lee, New Jersey to help set up the company's film laboratory. Returning home, Pathé had him set up a laboratory in Vincennes as well as organize a film studio in Boulogne-Billancourt.
In 1921, Henri Diamant-Berger directed the first ever film version of The Three Musketeers novel by Alexandre Dumas, père. By the end of the decade he had successfully made the transition to talkies and among his notable sound films was a remake of The Three Musketeers in 1933, this time creating a six-hour epic for which he wrote the screen adaptation.
For a short time in the mid-1920s, Henri Diamant-Berger made pictures in the United States including the 1925 drama "Fifty-Fifty" starring Lionel Barrymore. Through the Barrymore connection he acquired the screen rights for his 1932 French-language film "Claire de lune" that was a 1921 Broadway play written by John Barrymore's ex-wife, Blanche Oelrichs. Among his other directorial efforts is the 1927 silent film, Éducation de Prince, and two Arsène Lupin detective films in 1937. However, after directing "Tourbillon de Paris" in 1939, he lost eight full years to World War II. In 1951 he directed the acclaimed drama Monsieur Fabre starring Pierre Fresnay.
During the 1960s, Diamant-Berger devoted himself exclusively to producing, making several successful films including "La Belle Américaine" in 1961, "Un drôle de paroissien" in 1963 and "Allez France! " in 1966.
In a career that lasted sixty years, Henri Diamant-Berger was part of more than one hundred films as a director, producer or screenwriter. He died in Paris in 1972.