Marcel Carné, the son of a cabinet maker, entered the movies as the
assistant of
Jacques Feyder. At the age of 25 he directed his first movie
Jenny (1936). Colaborating with the writer
Jacques Prévert, the decorator
Alexandre Trauner,
the musician and composer
Maurice Jaubert and the actor
Jean Gabin he became the
great director of the pre-war era of the French cinema with the poetic
realism style (e.g.
Hotel du Nord (1938)). During the occupation of France by
Nazi-Germany he worked in the zone of the government of Vichy making
Children of Paradise (1945), a clear anti-Nazi parable and all time classic of French
cinema. After having been confronted with a purge trial he went on
filming but none of his later movies could catch up with his former
works.