Jean Boffety

Jean Boffety was one of the lesser-known (and, frankly, underappreciated) cinematographers of the French New Wave. The movement was defined primarily by a rejection of the conservative filmmaking paradigm, replacing more restricted ideas about dialogue and how to use the camera with innovative techniques like long tracking shots, rapid cutting, and breaking the fourth wall, along with pervasive existentialist themes. Jean Boffety was a frequent collaborator with director Robert Enrico, also one of the lesser-known and underappreciated figures of the French New Wave. Together they made movies like "The Wise Guys," a tale of revenge and redemption at a sawmill in France. One of Boffety's most memorable collaborations with Enrico was actually a short film (and Oscar-winner) called "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," a 28-minute-long piece about an American Civil War-era hanging that fails when the rope breaks, giving the condemned man a second chance. Boffety also worked several times with director Claude Sautet on critically acclaimed films such as "The Things of Life," wherein a man's life is told in exquisitely rendered flashbacks in the aftermath of a devastating car accident.