(1928-2000)
Director and screenwriter. Roger Vadim was born Roger Vadim Plemiannikov in Paris. He studied drama under Charles Dullin and started as a stage actor. He acted in and contributed to the scripts of Marc Allégret's Maria Chapdelaine (1950) and Futures vedettes (1955), and the latter starred Vadim's first wife, Brigitte Bardot. Vadim worked as Allegret's assistant for ten years and coscripted Michel Boisrond's Cette sacrée gamine (1956), also starring Bardot. He was also a journalist for Paris-Match.
Vadim made his directorial debut with the internationally successful Et Dieu créa la femme, with Bardot in the lead, which was released in 1956. Et Dieu créa la femme has been considered an important forerunner to the Nouvelle Vague or New Wave, because it opened the door for unknown film directors in its demonstration that newcomers could create commercially profitable films. In addition, Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut were impressed by Bardot's uncontained sexuality in the film. The film launched Bardot's international fame and has been acclaimed for its skillful use of Cinemascope and Eastmancolor.
Vadim's next films were Sait-on jamais (1957), a Berlin Bear-nominated film in which women protagonists continued to challenge traditional views of female sexuality, and Les bijoutiers du clair de lune (1958). His Les liaisons dangereuses , featuring Jeanne Moreau and Gérard Philippe, was among the top five French films at the box office in 1959. Vadim's vampiress film, Et mourir de plaisir (1960), starred his second wife, Annette Stroyberg Vadim. His next films were La bride sur le cou (1961) and Le repos du guerrier (1962), both starring Bardot. Catherine Deneuve played one of her early starring roles alongside Annie Girardot in Vadim's Le vice et la vertu (1963). He later directed Château en Suède (1963) and La ronde (1964), which marked his first collaboration with Jane Fonda, who became his third wife. She also starred in La curée (1966) and the Anglophone Barbarella (1968), a film adapted from a French science-fiction comic strip.
Some have argued that Vadim enjoyed flaunting the beauty of his wives and lovers in his films. He wrote a memoir titled Bardot, Deneuve, Fonda: My Life With the Three Most Beautiful Women in the World (1986), which seems to corroborate that theory. Vadim worked with other Hollywood stars besides Fonda. His Pretty Maids All in a Row (1971) featured Rock Hudson and Angie Dickenson. His next features were Hellé (1972) and Don Juan ou si Don Juan était une femme (1973), both with Bardot and another Vadim favorite, Robert Hossein. Also in the 1970s, Vadim directed La jeune fille assassinée (1974) and Une femme fidèle (1976), starring Sylvia Kristel, the actress who led in Just Jaeckin's 1974 erotic blockbuster, Emmanuelle. In the 1980s, Vadim directed Night Games (1980), Hot Touch (1982), and Surprise-Party (1983). His last film, before moving on to television, was the English-language And God Created Woman (1988), with Rebecca de Mornay.
Historical Dictionary of French Cinema by Dayna Oscherwitz & Mary Ellen Higgins
Guide to cinema. Academic. 2011.