Justine (1969)

In Alexandria, in 1938, Darley, a young British schoolmaster and poet, makes friends through Pursewarden, the British consular officer, with Justine, the beautiful and mysterious wife of a ... See full summary »

Director:

George Cukor

Writers:

Lawrence Durrell (novel), Lawrence B. Marcus (screenplay),

Stars:

Anouk Aimée, Dirk Bogarde, Robert Forster

1 win & 1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Anouk Aimée	...	Justine
Dirk Bogarde	...	Pursewarden
Robert Forster	...	Narouz
Anna Karina	...	Melissa
Philippe Noiret	...	Pombal
Michael York	...	Darley
John Vernon	...	Nessim
Jack Albertson	...	Cohen
Cliff Gorman	...	Toto
George Baker	...	British Ambassador David Mountolive
Elaine Church	...	Liza
Michael Constantine	...	Memlik Pasha
Marcel Dalio	...	French Consul General
Michael Dunn	...	Mnemjian
Barry Morse	...	Colonel Maskelyne

Storyline

In Alexandria, in 1938, Darley, a young British schoolmaster and poet, makes friends through Pursewarden, the British consular officer, with Justine, the beautiful and mysterious wife of a Coptic banker. He observes the affairs of her heart and incidentally discovers that she is involved in a plot against the British, meant to arm the Jewish underground in Palestine. The plot finally fails, Justine is sent to jail and Darley decides to return to England.

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Plot Keywords:

female nudity | based on novel | character name in title

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English French

Release Date:

6 August 1969 (USA)

Also Known As:

Alexandria

Filming Locations:

Stage 18, 20th Century Fox Studios - 10201 Pico Blvd., Century City, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

Technical Specs

Runtime:

116 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Anouk Aimee couldn't bear being without her lover and future husband Albert Finney during location shooting and wanted to leave. Director George Cukor persuaded her friend Omar Sharif to convince her of the dire consequences for her career if she did. Although Sharif failed, Finney was able to convince her to finish the film.

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Quotes

Pursewarden: [to Justine] When the hell are you going to stop being an old sin-cushion - into which we all have to thrust our rusty pins!

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Connections

Featured in Sex at 24 Frames Per Second (2003)

User Reviews

Forty-karat kitsch baroque

George Cukor's adaptation of Lawrence Durrell's ALEXANDRIA QUARTET forms the shape of a dial made of character traits from medieval mystery plays--Fanatic Patriotism, Sexual Cunning, Heartless Bargaining, Furtive Retreat. If Durrell sought to catalogue every human impulse, Cukor had another, lower agenda that serves the material beautifully: shifting these allegorical characters into ripe, lustrous kitsch icons who seem to have time-travelled from a Sternberg movie circa 1931.

The whole picture seems to have undergone a time-machine move from THE SHANGHAI GESTURE to swinging '69. It's Cukor's most vibrant movie visually, and each gorgeously staged and color-patterned shot finds a new way to layer an Islamic tapestry atop psychedelic poster art.

Cukor, brought in as a replacement, brings a vigor to the material you don't associate with him, and at 70, he still knew how to shape the beats of a scene like a Broadway pro. It is reported that he and the star, Anouk Aimee, loathed one another, and in honesty it's easy to see Cukor's frustration: she gives a dismally coy, incommunicative performance as the black widow whose web forms the story. She seems aberrantly at odds with the coolly dignified, taciturn style of the other performances: Dirk Bogarde, as the Graham Greene-ish diplomat with a lurid secret may never have been more creepily sympathetic than he is here. And John Vernon, an actor best known for playing pompous authoritarians in B movies, has such noble composure as Justine's long-suffering husband that he seems to turn into a folk-art engraving of a noble and besieged human soul.