Eva Green and the mystique of the French actress

Colette Marchant soars above the crowd, sequined and befeathered, moving with ethereal grace as she performs her famous trapeze act. The audience are in awe. As played by Eva Green in Disney’s live-action remake of Dumbo, Marchant is the ultimate French woman of our imagination: poised, daringly styled, and full of mystery. Describing her role, the actor called her “a bird in a cage – and quite an enigmatic one at that”.

The same could be said of Green herself. Or, at least, that’s how her adoring fans have come to view her. Born to star Marlène Jobert and raised in Paris, Green is a prime example of our obsessions with French actresses. There is a sense of enigma to her that we can’t resist. Having paired her pale complexion with the dark locks she’s been dyeing since the age of 15, Green has a Gothic air that’s made her a natural muse for Dumbo’s director, Tim Burton. Her roles in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (2016) and Dark Shadows (2012) offered her more to chew on than the love interest roles of Kingdom of Heaven (2005) or Perfect Sense (2011). And while her best work was undoubtedly in Showtime’s drama series Penny Dreadful, she’s struggled to break free from the “femme fatale” image that’s defined her since 2006’s Casino Royale.

Bond does appear to have a fondness for Gallic women, including Green, Sophie Marceau (The World is Not Enough), and Léa Seydoux (Spectre). They all embody sophistication and seduction, without the emotional attachment. It’s a perfect deal for 007. Green’s Vesper Lynd coolly introduces herself with the words: “I’m the money.” That said, this isn’t the only kind of French woman Hollywood has fixated on, as long as the image of Audrey Tautou’s Amelie looms. She’s as indecipherable as Bond’s women, but sexual magnetism has been traded for elfin innocence. International audiences gobbled up Amelie’s joie de vivre in Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s comedy; it remains the highest-grossing French-language film released in the US.

Meanwhile, the saucer-eyed Tautou, with her little bob haircut, became the poster child for modern whimsy. She spawned so many poor imitators, you could blame her for the infestation of “manic pixie dream girls” of the early 2000s. Her delight in simple things, from cracking a crème brûlée to stealing a garden gnome, spoke to a different kind of French self-indulgence. This was about the luxury of slowing down our own lives in order to appreciate our everyday surroundings.

Of course, Amelie couldn’t have existed without the French New Wave of the 1950s and 1960s, which not only shaped so much of what we now deem French “cool”, but created archetypes for the nation’s women. When Hollywood thinks of France, its mind is drawn immediately to Brigitte Bardot, the original sex kitten, or to Catherine Deneuve, the aloof beauty. Or, perhaps, it reflects on Anna Karina’s melancholic stare or Jeanne Moreau’s sultry pout. The films of Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut and their circle had a habit of putting women on a pedestal. These women command immense power when they’re on screen, but there’s something often mythical about them. They’re celluloid goddesses. You need only watch the way Godard’s camera fixates on Karina’s face in 1962’s Vivre Sa Vie – it’s pure adulation.

Then came the likes of Béatrice Dalle, whose roles in Betty Blue (1986) and Trouble Every Day (2001) helped cement the image of the sexually free (and provocative) French woman. Whichever way the outside world chooses to see them, French women are so often defined by qualities that make them seem inaccessible. For actresses today, it’s both a boon and an obstacle in their careers.

Many French actresses have circumvented the ageism of the film industry and enjoyed substantial careers and international recognition in their later years. Juliette Binoche, now 55, hops smoothly from blockbuster productions such as Ghost in the Shell (2017) and Godzilla (2014), to the work of internationally recognised French auteurs, such as Olivier Assayas and Claire Denis. Meanwhile, Isabelle Huppert at 66 continues to be a favourite among cinephiles, known for her bold choices – most notably, her role in 2016’s Elle, as a victim of sexual assault who decides to track down the perpetrator. The French woman’s sophistication has ensured they’ve been treated with a level of gravitas sadly not afforded to many of their American contemporaries.

Yet, the image also comes with boundaries. Green is one of many French actresses who have struggled to be seen as more than the femme fatale, ever since her risqué debut in The Dreamers (2003), about a group of students all enraptured by the New Wave movement. 300: Rise of an Empire (2014) and Sin City: A Dame to Kill For (2014) gave her little to do other than traipse around in low-cut dresses, while her masterfully nuanced work in Cracks (2009) and White Bird in a Blizzard (2014) remains criminally underseen. Marion Cotillard, too, has found few roles in Hollywood that match the fearsomeness of her Oscar-winning performance in La Vie en Rose (2007). However, she’s delivered plenty of turns as the mysterious woman who beguiles those around her, but has little inner life of her own.

There’s also the question as to how much these classic images of New Wave muses may have helped whitewash the idea of French womanhood. Names such as Sofia Boutella, Aïssa Maïga, and Pom Klementieff should not be ignored. At last year’s Cannes Film Festival, 16 black French actresses staged a red carpet protest in order to bring attention to the pervasive racism of the nation’s film industry. It was a call, among many things, to no longer typecast them in the roles of cleaners, prostitutes, or criminals.

While the allure of the French muse may have cast a spell over cinema, we shouldn’t allow it to cloud our vision. We may celebrate these women for their sense of liberty, power, and sensuality, but it’s important to acknowledge, too, how those qualities can exist in so many different women, in so many different ways. There’s no right way to be French.

Dumbo is released in UK cinemas on 29 March