Jean Yanne, born in 1933, was a French actor known for his sharp wit and satirical edge. He made a memorable impact in The Viscount (1967), where his performance added layers of complexity to the film's narrative. In Weekend (1967), Yanne's role further exemplified his ability to blend humor with social commentary, a hallmark of his work during the late 1960s. His contributions to French cinema extend beyond acting, as he also ventured into screenwriting and directing, leaving a lasting mark on the genre.
Weekend
Roland and Corinne are a bourgeois couple. Each has a secret lover and conspires to murder the other. They drive out to Corinne's parents' home in the country to secure her inheritance from her dying father, resolving to resort to murder if necessary. The trip becomes a chaotically picaresque journey through a French countryside populated by bizarre characters and punctuated by violent car accidents. After their own Facel-Vega is destroyed in a collision, they wander through a series of vignettes involving class struggle and figures from literature and history, such as Louis Antoine de Saint-Just and Emily Brontë. When Corinne and Roland eventually arrive at her parents' place, they discover that her father has died and her mother refuses to give them a share of the spoils. They kill her and hit the road again, only to fall into the hands of a group of hippie revolutionaries (calling themselves the Seine and Oise Liberation Front) that support themselves through theft and cannibalism. Killed during an escape attempt, Roland is chopped up and cooked.
