Les Nuits Révolutionnaires

The eighteenth-century French writer Nicolas Restif de la Bretonne recorded history, but so embroidered with his own imagination that the distinction between fact and fiction is often blurred. He was nicknamed 'The Owl', because it was his custom to walk the streets of Paris at night. Les Nuits Révolutionnaires (based on Les Nuits de Paris) spans the period 1789 - 1793 and, rather than giving a factual account of those years, Restif's writing brings to life the nocturnal world of the troubled city, as he observed it during the hours of darkness. He conjures up the other characters who also haunted the shadows - amongst them The Procuress, The Blind Man and The Lamplighter.

He was not just an indefatigable snoop and gifted storyteller, but also a philosopher, his sympathies never quite clear because of his inability to place ideals and theories above humane considerations.

Les Nuits Révolutionnaires immerses the viewer in Restif's strange existence, away from the loud mobs, in the troubled backwaters of the Revolution. To this turbulent arena is added the drama of his own life and the inspired wit of his fantasies.

Les Nuits Révolutionnaires begins a few nights before the fall of the Bastille on 14 July 1789 and covers the King's execution and the start of the Reign of Terror, ending in June 1793, but the events of the Revolution form only a background to a dramatisation of Restif's fantastic stories.

In Les Nuits Révolutionnaires, Restif is played by Michel Aumont, his daughters by Isabelle Gelinas and Sophie Bouilloux and the three young revolutionaries whom they befriend by Christophe Brault, Jean-Pierre Lorit and Xavier de Guillebon. Also in the cast are Maria Casares (The Procuress), Michel Bouquet (The Money Lender), Bernard Fresson (The Bull), Daniel Mesguich (The Nameless Man) and Gérard Desarthe (Renaud de la Grimiere). Magnificent sets reconstruct in faithful detail quartiers of eighteenth-century Paris.