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Wedding in Blood
Wedding in Blood
	Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Claude Chabrol
Written by	Claude Chabrol
Produced by	André Génovès
Starring	Stéphane Audran; Michel Piccoli
Cinematography	Jean Rabier
Edited by	Jacques Gaillard; Monique Gaillard
Music by	Pierre Jansen
Release date	12 April 1973 (France);
Running time	95 minutes
Country	France
Language	French

Wedding in Blood (French: Les Noces rouges), also known as Red Wedding in the UK,^[2] is a 1973 French crime drama film written and directed by Claude Chabrol.^[1]

Plot

In a small French town, the deputy mayor Pierre is having an affair with Lucienne, the mayor's wife. So that they can be together more often, Pierre poisons his sickly wife without anybody suspecting, and Lucienne starts visiting his house at night. Her husband Paul, aware of the goings-on, blackmails Pierre into supporting a dubious land deal. To escape this, the two lovers decide to get rid of Paul. Pierre kills Paul on a lonely road and sets fire to his car, making his death appear as an accident, while Lucienne pretends that she was hurled out of the car before it caught fire. Under orders from Paris, the police treat the incident as a traffic accident. Hélène, Lucienne's teenage daughter from a previous relationship, asks for a follow-up investigation to clear her mother of any suspicion. The new investigation uncovers the crime, and Paul and Lucienne do not deny their deeds when arrested. Asked by the police inspector why they hadn't left to live somewhere else, they reply that they had never thought of that.

Cast

Stéphane Audran as Lucienne Delamare
Michel Piccoli as Pierre Maury
Claude Piéplu as Paul Delamare
Clotilde Joano as Clotilde Maury
Eliana De Santis as Hélène Chevalier, Lucienne's daughter
François Robert as Auriol
Daniel Lecourtois as prefect

Background

Wedding in Blood was entered into the 23rd Berlin International Film Festival.^[3]

Wedding in Blood was filmed in the commune of Valençay.^[1] The story is based on a real event in the commune of Bourganeuf in 1970.^[4] René Balaire, a heating engineer, was found burned to death in his car, from which his wife Yvette had escaped unharmed. The police investigation found that he had died from a revolver bullet fired by her lover Bernard Cousty, who had previously killed his own wife.

References

^ ^a ^b ^c "Les Noces rouges" (in French). Ciné-ressources. Retrieved 12 June 2023.
^ Roud, Richard, ed. (1980). Cinema: A Critical Dictionary. The Major Film-makers. Vol. 1. The Viking Press. p. 199.
^ "Wedding in Blood: Awards". IMDb. Retrieved 29 June 2010.
^ Bressy, Floris (20 October 2011). "Les Noces rouges, fait-divers creusois pour chef d'oeuvre chabrolien". Le Populaire (in French). Retrieved 13 June 2023.