Latest news with #Dequenne
The Guardian
28-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Émilie Dequenne obituary
In the films of Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the Belgian social realist brothers who specialise in studies of life on the breadline, a roving hand-held camera tends to cling to the main character as closely as a shadow. Rosetta (1999), their first picture to feature a female protagonist, follows a tenacious, single-minded teenager who lives in a trailer park with her alcoholic mother on the edge of the desolate town of Seraing. She scratches around for work, poaches fish from a muddy river using worms scooped from the ground as bait and is not above betrayal and back-stabbing to get what she wants, even if it is just a job at a local waffle stand. The picture was compared favourably to Robert Bresson's Mouchette (1967). The brothers described it as 'a war film' and Rosetta herself as 'a warrior'. Jean-Pierre pointed out that the characters 'are always responsible for what they do or don't do. We don't treat any of [them] like victims.' Victimhood would have been a poor fit for the extraordinary Émilie Dequenne, who has died of cancer aged 43. With her shrewd eyes and blunt hexagonal face, she brought a bracingly unsentimental single-mindedness to Rosetta. Her taciturn, tough-nut exterior did not preclude glimpses of the wounded child within. Dequenne was just 16 when she was cast, and 17 when she was joint winner of the best actress prize at Cannes for her performance. Rosetta also took home the festival's top prize, the Palme d'Or. Dequenne had worked in theatre before, but Rosetta was her first screen appearance. She was chosen by the Dardennes from among 300 applicants. 'The brothers were amused by her letter – 'wildly pretentious', they say, still smiling at her chutzpah,' reported the critic Jonathan Romney in 2000. 'She came in high heels, heavily made up, her hair done up,' said Luc. 'For her, it was an event, she thought she had to be really well-dressed. We started the scenes and we saw she was magnificent, she was there, everything she did, we felt that the camera loved her.' The performance is all the more astounding, Romney wrote, because 'Dequenne clearly isn't the film's stubbornly uncommunicative feral child, but … an articulate and rather glamorous young woman who clearly has her showbiz future sorted out.' The Dardennes' working methods were unconventional. For the climactic scene, in which Rosetta tries to kill herself and her mother only to find that the gas in their caravan has run out, she was required to lug heavy gas canisters for the entire five-minute take; the brothers later pointed out that they kindly released five kilos from the 18 kilo container to make her task a little easier. During some shots, actors were prodded with rods during filming to shove them into position while the camera was running. Rosetta, Dequenne said, 'was a small film with a small crew where everybody worked together'. Her next film, Christophe Gans's spectacular period fantasy Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001), could not have been more different. 'I didn't even get to see the director because he was watching everything on his monitor, so I communicated with his assistant.' Thereafter, she built a career of intelligent choices and authoritative performances. Among the highlights was André Téchiné's cool-headed, factually based drama The Girl on the Train (2009), in which she starred as a woman who falsely alleges that she has been the victim of an antisemitic attack; Catherine Deneuve played her mother. 'It was really about a young woman who had lost her way so completely that she did not know how to get back,' Dequenne said. More than a decade after Rosetta, she had the lead in a film that exceeded even that one in its rawness and intensity. In Joachim Lafosse's Our Children (2012), loosely inspired by real events, she played Murielle, a mother who is driven over the edge of sanity by her controlling father-in-law. In the distressing conclusion, she murders her four children. Dequenne makes this woebegone character sorrowful without pleading for the audience's pity, and shows her to be a bright woman whose spirit is finally crushed. She also rises to the colossal task of visualising the exact point of Murielle's breakdown. In an unbroken three-and-a-half-minute close-up, she sings along to the radio as she drives, her melodious voice gradually racked with sobs. 'Making a film like that is something that you have to survive,' Dequenne said. The survivors of the tragedy that inspired the picture accused her and Lafosse of being 'exploiters'. Writing in the Observer, Philip French called Our Children 'part Greek tragedy, part case history, part admonitory social parable about class, race and colonialism'. The scene in which Murielle slips a knife into her handbag while shopping with her children was, he said, 'as chilling as anything I've ever seen in the cinema'. Dequenne was born in Beloeil, Belgium, to Brigitte and Daniel, a carpenter. She attended the Académie de Musique et des Arts de la Parole in nearby Saint-Ghislain from the age of 12, and got her earliest acting experience in a local theatre workshop. A rare English-language role came her way in Mary McGuckian's historical drama The Bridge of San Luis Rey (2004) – adapted from Thornton Wilder's novel – set in 18th-century Peru and co-starring Robert De Niro, Harvey Keitel and Kathy Bates. In the BBC drama The Missing (2014), she played a translator. In recent years, she won a Magritte award for her performance as a well-meaning but credulous nurse caught up in far right politics in Lucas Belvaux's This Is Our Land (2017). She won a César for the infidelity drama The Things We Say, The Things We Do (2020), also known as Love Affair(s), and played a grieving parent in Lukas Dhont's Oscar-nominated tearjerker Close (2022). Her last screen role came in TKT (2024), a Belgian drama about school bullying. She is survived by her husband, Michel Ferracci, as well as by a daughter, Milla Savarese, from an earlier relationship with the DJ Alexandre Savarese. Émilie Dequenne, actor, born 29 August 1981; died 16 March 2025
Yahoo
22-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
NEWS OF THE WEEK: Actor Émilie Dequenne dies of rare cancer at 43
Belgian actor Emilie Dequenne died on Sunday of a rare cancer in a hospital outside Paris, her family and agent have shared. She was 43. Dequenne revealed in October 2023 that she was suffering from adrenocortical carcinoma, a cancer of the adrenal gland. Her first role in Rosetta, by the Dardenne brothers, launched her career after she won Best Actress at the Cannes Film Festival for her performance in the film, which also won the Palme D'Or. She picked up a string of other awards in appearances in mainly French-language films, including the 2009 movie The Girl on the Train and the 2012 drama Our Children.
Boston Globe
18-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
Émilie Dequenne, Belgian actress who starred in ‘Rosetta,' dies at 43
She went on to star in numerous films, including 'The Brotherhood of the Wolf,' 'The Bridge of San Luis Rey,' 'Our Children,' and 'This Is Our Land.' Advertisement Ms. Dequenne revealed in October 2023 that she had been diagnosed with adrenocortical carcinoma, a rare and aggressive adrenal cancer. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up She talked about her diagnosis in an interview on the television show "Sept à Huit" on French network TF1 that aired in December 2024. After her initial symptoms, she said, she had blood tests and scans, and eventually faced the discovery of a large mass. She spoke about the need to be candid about her illness and the loneliness that it caused. Over her career, Ms. Dequenne appeared in nearly 50 films and won numerous awards, including a César, one of France's top film honors, for best supporting actress in 'Love Affair(s),' ('Les Choses Qu'on Dit, les Choses Qu'on Fait'), a 2020 film directed by Emmanuel Mouret. But she was perhaps best known for her roles in the 2012 drama "Our Children" ("À perdre la raison"), by Belgian director Joachim Lafosse, and "Rosetta." When she auditioned for the role in "Rosetta," she made an immediate impression, Luc Dardenne recalled in an interview with French radio station FranceInfo that aired Monday. "The first day she shot in front of a real camera, she managed to bring the whole team together," Dardenne told Belgian broadcaster RTBF. "That's what happened, and it got better and better as the shoot progressed." Ms. Dequenne was born in Beloeil, Belgium, on Aug. 29, 1981. She studied drama at the Académie de Musique et des Arts de la Parole de Baudour in Belgium. She began her acting career at a company based in a region of Belgium near the border with France. Advertisement She is survived by her husband, Michel Ferracci, and a daughter, Milla Savarese, with her former partner, Belgian DJ Alexandre Savarese. In May, while her cancer was in remission, she celebrated the 25th anniversary of "Rosetta" at the Cannes Film Festival. She also promoted a new film, "Survive," released last year. Most recently, she appeared in "TKT," a film about bullying that is set at a Belgian high school. This article originally appeared in
Yahoo
17-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Celebrated Actor Dead at 43 Following Battle With Rare Cancer
Internationally renowned actor Émilie Dequenne has died at 43 following a battle with a rare cancer, The Guardian reported. Dequenne revealed in Oct. 2023 that she was suffering from adrenocortical carcinoma, a cancer which affects the kidney's adrenal glands. She passed away on Sunday night in a hospital outside of Paris. Dequenne was a celebrated actor who appeared in a number of French and Belgian films, which found appreciative audiences in America and Canada, in addition to several English-language features. She broke onto the scene in 1999, winning Cannes' Best Actress award for her role in the Dardenne Brothers' social-realist drama Rosetta, about a woman (Dequenne) living in a trailer park with her alcoholic mother. In addition to Dequenne's award, Rosetta won that year's coveted Palme d' is perhaps best-remembered for her role in the 2001 action-horror-fantasy The Brotherhood of the Wolf, which went on to gross nearly $12 million in the States and became the sixth highest-grossing French-language film of all time in the U.S. She also starred in the 2009 drama The Girl on the Train (not to be confused with the 2016 film of the same name starring Emily Blunt) and the Belgian comedy Not My Type (2014). In 2012, Dequenne returned to Cannes with the drama Our Children, for which she took the best actress prize in the festival's Un Certain Regard bracket. Most recently, Dequenne starred in Lukas Dhont's haunting drama Close, which was nominated for Best International Feature at the 2024 Academy Awards. Her final role was in the English-language film Survival, released last year. She is survived by her husband, author Michel Ferracci; and her daughter Milla Savarese, whom she shares with her former husband Alexandre Savarese.
The Independent
17-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Marion Cotillard and Eva Green pay tribute to ‘extraordinary' Emilie Dequenne
Belgian actress Emilie Dequenne has been remembered as 'extraordinary' by her fellow stars of French cinema, Marion Cotillard and Eva Green. The Missing star died at the age of 43, her agent said on Monday, after she revealed she had been diagnosed with a 'rare cancer' in October 2023. According to reports, Dequenne had been suffering from adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC), an aggressive cancer of the adrenal gland. On Instagram, Green wrote: 'Emilie was already a star, an extraordinary actress who I revered,' when they first met during a drama school presentation, and called her 'humble, encouraging, so full of light and pure kindness'. The Penny Dreadful and Casino Royale star added that she last saw Dequenne at the Cannes Film Festival, where the star was a co-winner in 1999 for her role in Palme d'Or winning film Rosetta. 'When I saw her last summer, she was so vibrant and full of life, we were both certain that she had vanquished the rare form of cancer she had been battling,' she added. 'Her death has left me stunned… heartbroken… as it has left all those who knew her, and even those who knew her only in her films. She was grace, light, and all things excellent.' Cotillard wrote in French that she will 'forever cherish what we shared', and called Dequenne a 'sublime human' and a 'genius actress'. The Oscar winner said 'you have been and will be an source of infinite inspiration for me', and added that she had studied Dequenne's work. 'I am going to find a hard time realising,' she said. 'I will always find this unjust.' Cotillard said she 'loved' and will 'miss' the actress, also known for playing police officer Laurence Relaud in British anthology drama The Missing. The Missing stars James Nesbitt as the father of a boy who disappears during a family holiday in France. Dequenne also starred in horror-action film Brotherhood Of The Wolf (2001) alongside Vincent Cassel, Monica Bellucci and Samuel Le Bihan. Her other roles included 2009's The Girl On The Train, in which her character Jeanne makes up a shocking story about a racially motivated attack on a train, and 2012 crime drama Our Children. She also played a sound recordist called Charlotte, who learns that her mother has been murdered, in noughties movie Ecoute Le Temps, and a mother in 2022 coming-of-age film Close. Dequenne cried after receiving the Cannes prize for Rosetta, in what was her first role in film when she was 18. She returned to the festival in 2024 for the 25th anniversary of Rosetta, which tells the story of a young girl's efforts to keep her job in the face of her own schizophrenia. Her last film was the post-apocalyptic thriller Survive, by French director Frederic Jardin. Dequenne was married to actor Michel Ferracci and had a daughter, Milla Savarese.
