The Woman on the Beach

Director: Jean Renoir

1947 / 71min / 35mm

Though mutilated by RKO Pictures following a disastrous test screening, Renoir’s final Hollywood feature remains a film unlike any in its director’s filmography—not to speak of contemporary American cinema—a marvel of brooding atmosphere in which a Coast Guard officer haunted by the memory of a maritime tragedy (Robert Ryan), recently engaged, is bewitched by a dark beauty (Joan Bennett), the wife of a blind painter, whom he meets while riding at seaside, his attraction to her by no means unrequited. A disarmingly frank depiction of consuming, destructive erotic obsession, with a roiling, elemental score by Hanns Eisler contributing to the palpable sense of gathering doom.

Distributor: Warner Bros.

35mm print courtesy of The Library of Congress. Restored by the Library of Congress and The Film Foundation. Funding provided by the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation.

Part of Neuro-Noir