Cordelia Dvorák’s intimate documentary about Marceline Loridan-Ivens – writer, director, and
Holocaust survivor – captures her irresistible personality
While still little-known outside
France, the inimitable Marceline Loridan-Ivens was a formidable force of nature. A Holocaust survivor, her awe-inspiring resilience is deeply felt in her works as a writer and director. Finishing
shooting mere weeks before her death in 2018 at the age of 90, Cordelia Dvorák’s intimate documentary is as vibrant as the signature auburn shade of Loridan-Ivens’ short, unruly hair.
Loridan-Ivens’ harrowing experience as a teenager at Auschwitz-Birkenau, where she befriended Simone Veil, undoubtedly informed the ceaseless energy with which Loridan-Ivens embraced life and arts. In her brief period as an
Actor in Jean Rouch’s 1960s cinéma vérité films, she sparkles with a lively curiosity and an irresistible charm. Equally arresting is her romantic and creative partnership with her husband, leftist documentary film-maker Joris Ivens. At the height of the Vietnam war, at the invitation of Ho Chi Minh, the pair travelled to Vietnam and made the resolutely anti-imperialist 17th Parallel: Vietnam in War, which documented the devastating effects of
American bombing.