Michel Subor

Michel Subor (, born Mischa Subotzki; 2 February 1935 – 17 January 2022) was a French actor who gained initial fame with the starring role, Bruno Forestier, in Jean-Luc Godard's second feature, Le petit soldat, but the French government banned it until 1963 because of its political content, touching on terrorism during the undeclared Algerian War. He acted in a couple of American films in the late 1960s including the role of Claude Jade's husband in Alfred Hitchcock's Topaz. In 1999, he once again played a character named Bruno Forestier in Beau Travail, a highly praised variation of Billy Budd. He would go on to make three more films with its director, Claire Denis.

Early life and education Michel Subor was born Mischa Subotzki in France in 1935, to anti-Bolshevik parents from the Soviet Union who had immigrated a few years earlier. His father was an engineer in Moscow, and his mother was born in Azerbaijan. He had a sister who moved to the United States as an adult. His first leading role came by playing the lover of Brigitte Bardot's character in La Bride sur le Cou (1961). The year before he had completed Subor's most important early role as Bruno Forestier, a French deserter in Geneva in Jean-Luc Godard's Le Petit Soldat (1960), set against terrorist acts in France and Switzerland during the guerre sans nom of the Algerian War. The film starred Anna Karina in her debut. Due to its politically sensitive content, the French government banned its release until 1963, after the end of the war. A new print was released in 2012. The critic Roger Ebert wrote that "Godard, in 1960, making a film about the Algerian War, was portraying the sort of intellectual and moral confusion that good men have when they confront senseless events."

In 2005 Jacques Mandelbaum described Subor in Le Monde as one of the greatest actors in French cinema, but said that his roles in the 1960s and 1970s were not "as favorable, ambiguous, fascinating as the Little Soldier."

Subor worked with the director Paul Gégauff, in The Reflux (1965), adapted from a novel by Robert Louis Stevenson. But the producer had not acquired the rights and the film was left unfinished in 1965. The next year he was in Wild Innocence (2000) directed by Philippe Garrel. She said of him: "Michel Subor is not a celebrity in L'Intrus; he is the intruder." ("Sur le plateau de L'Intrus, il a captivé tout le monde, mais personne n'a voulu percer son mystère. Michel Sobor n'est pas le personnage de L'Intrus, il est L'Intrus.")

Filmography Film

Frou-Frou (1955) - Le jeune homme au restaurant Un drole de dimanche (1958) - Un élève du cours (uncredited) Mon pote le gitan (1959) - Bruno Pittuiti La Bride sur le Cou (1961) - Alain Varnier Le Petit Soldat (1963) - Bruno Forestier

Television

+ Year Title Role Notes 1989 A Tale of Two Cities Le père de Darnay (Darnay's Father) TV miniseries 1992 Counterstrike Yuri Episode: "Trigger Finger" 2018 War on Beasts Pierre Duruv 5 episodes