Les Enfants terribles (French pronunciation: [lez‿ɑ̃fɑ̃ teʁibl]; literal English translation: The Terrible Children; English title: The Strange Ones) is a 1950 French film directed by Jean-Pierre Melville, with a screenplay adapted by Jean Cocteau from his 1929 novel of the same name about the tangled relationship of a close brother and sister.
The film's soundtrack of Vivaldi concertos was unusual at the time and praised for its use in increasing the dramatic tension of the plot.
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Les Enfants Terribles is a 1929 novel by Jean Cocteau, published by Editions Bernard Grasset. It concerns two siblings, Elisabeth and Paul, who isolate themselves from the world as they grow up, an isolation which is shattered by the stresses of their adolescence. It was first translated into English by Samuel Putnam in 1930 and published by Brewer & Warren. A later English translation by Rosamond Lehmann was published in the U.S. by New Directions (ISBN 0811200213) in 1955, and in Canada by Mclelland & Stewart in 1966, with the title translated as The Holy Terrors. The book is illustrated by the author's own drawings.
The novel was made into a film of the same name, a collaboration between Cocteau and director Jean-Pierre Melville, in 1950, and inspired the opera of the same name by Philip Glass. Miloš Petrović composed a chamber opera based on the novel. The ballet La Boule de neige by the choreographer Fabrizio Monteverde, with music by Pierluigi Castellano, is also based on this novel. The story was adapted by the writer Gilbert Adair for his 1988 novel The Holy Innocents, which was the basis for Bernardo Bertolucci's 2003 film The Dreamers.
The Holy Innocents (1988) is a novel by Scottish writer Gilbert Adair. It is about three young cinephiles: two French siblings and an American stranger who enters their world. Its themes were inspired by Jean Cocteau's 1929 novel Les Enfants Terribles (The Holy Terrors) and by the 1950 film of the same name directed by Jean-Pierre Melville.