Jean Renoir (15 September 1894 – 12 February 1979) was a French film director, screenwriter, actor, producer and author. As a film director and actor, he made more than forty films from the silent era to the end of the 1960s. As an author, he wrote the definitive biography of his father, the painter, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Renoir, My Father (1962). In the 1930s, Renoir was associated with the Popular Front, and several of his films reflect the movement's left-wing politics and deal with social issues as well as class disparities. He was perhaps the most significant director of the poetic realism movement. The satirical comedy-drama film The Rules of the Game (1939) is often cited by critics as among the greatest films ever made; it is the only film to earn a place among the top ten films in the respected British Film Institute's Sight & Sound decennial critics' poll for every decade from the poll's inception in 1952 through the 2012 list. Other important works are Grand Illusion (1937), A Day in the Country (1946) and The River (1951). Andrew Sarris in his influential book of film criticism The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929–1968 included him in the "pantheon" of the 14 greatest film directors who had worked in the United States.

Filmography

• 1978Renoir, My Father — Book
• BBC2 Play of the Week — Book
• 1974The Little Theatre of Jean Renoir — The Narrator/Host, Writer, Director
• 1973Carola — Writer
• 1969Postface: La Petite Marchande d'allumettes — Jean Renoir
• 1962The Elusive Corporal — Director, Writer
• 1961Jean Renoir parle de son art — Interviewee
• 1960Experiment in Evil — Producer, Screenplay, Director
• 1959Picnic on the Grass — Director, Screenplay
• 1956Elena and Her Men — Director, Writer
• 1955French Cancan — Adaptation, Director, Writer
• 1952The Golden Coach — Director, Screenplay
• 1951The River — Director, Screenplay, Producer
• 1950The Ways of Love — Director
• 1947The Woman on the Beach — Director, Screenplay
• 1946A Day in the Country — Père Poulain, Director, Writer
• 1946The Diary of a Chambermaid — Director
• 1945The Southerner — Director, Writer
• 1944A Salute to France — Director, Screenplay
• 1943The Amazing Mrs. Holliday — Co-Director
• 1943This Land Is Mine — Director, Screenplay, Producer
• 1941Swamp Water — Director
• 1941Tosca — Co-Director
• 1940Cristobal's Gold — Dialogue
• 1939The Rules of the Game — Octave, Screenplay, Director, Producer
• 1938La Bête Humaine — Cabuche, Director, Screenplay
• 1938La Marseillaise — Writer, Director, Producer
• 1937Grand Illusion — Director, Writer
• 1937The Spanish Earth — Narrator (voice)
• 1936Life Is Ours — Le patron du bistrot, Director, Writer
• 1936The Crime of Monsieur Lange — Screenplay, Director
• 1936The Lower Depths — Director, Writer
• 1935A Bum Deal — Director
• 1935Toni — Author, Director, Screenplay
• 1934Madame Bovary — Director, Screenplay
• 1933Chotard and Co. — Director, Writer
• 1932Boudu Saved from Drowning — Director, Screenplay
• 1932Night at the Crossroads — Director, Screenplay
• 1931Baby's Laxative — Director, Writer
• 1931La Chienne — Director, Screenplay
• 1931Mam'zelle Nitouche — Master sergeant (uncredited)
• 1930Little Red Riding Hood — Compère le Loup, Writer, Producer
• 1930The Pursuit of Happiness
• 1929Le Bled — Director
• 1928The Little Match Girl — Director, Producer, Writer
• 1928The Sad Sack — Director, Writer
• 1928The Tournament — Director, Adaptation
• 1927Backbiters — le sous-préfet, Director, Screenplay, Producer, Editor
• 1927Charleston Parade — Angel, Director
• 1927La P’tite Lili — Man with Bowler Hat
• 1927Marquitta — Adaptation, Director
• 1926Nana — Director, Producer
• 1925Whirlpool of Fate — Director, Producer, Set Decoration

Appearances as themselves (21)

• 2021Le Parti du cinéma — Self (voice) (archive footage)
• 2021The Emma Bovary Trial — Self - Filmmaker (archive footage)
• 2017Quand Jean devint Renoir — Self (archive footage)
• 2014François Truffaut l'insoumis — Self (archive footage)
• 2012Cinéastes de notre temps : Erich von Stroheim — Self
• 1994Un tournage à la campagne — Self
• 1993Jean Renoir: Part One - From La Belle Époque to World War II — Self (archive footage)
• 1987La règle du jeu de Jean Renoir: Une analyse du film par l'image — Self (archive footage)
• Encyclopédie audiovisuelle du cinéma — Self (archive footage)
• 1971The Christian Licorice Store — Self
• 1970Langlois — Self
• 1969D'un Céline l'autre — Self
• 1969Directing Actors by Jean Renoir — Self
• 1968Louis Lumière — Self
• 1967Jean Renoir, le patron, 2e partie: La direction d'acteur — Self - Interviewee
• 1967Jean Renoir, le patron, 1re partie: La recherche du relatif — Self
• 1967Jean Renoir, le patron, 3e partie: La règle et l'exception — Self
• Discorama — Self
• Cinépanorama — Self
• 1956L'album de famille de Jean Renoir — Self
• 1915Those of Our Land — Self