About

Known credits:
61
Birthday:
1923-06-22
Place of birth:
Paris, France
Website:
N/A

José Giovanni

Overview

José Giovanni (22 June 1923, Paris, France – 24 April 2004, Lausanne, Switzerland) was the pseudonym of Joseph Damiani, a French writer and film-maker of Corsican origin who became a naturalized Swiss citizen in 1986.

A former collaborationist and criminal who at one time was sentenced to death, Giovanni often drew his inspiration from personal experience or from real gangsters, such as Abel Danos in his 1960 film Classe tous risques, overlooking that they had been members of the French Gestapo. In his films as well as his novels, while praising masculine friendships and advocating the confrontation of the individual against the world, he often championed the underworld but was always careful to hide his own links with the Nazi occupiers of France during World War II.

Of Corsican descent, Joseph Damiani received a good education, studying at the Collège Stanislas de Paris and the Lycée Janson de Sailly. His father, a professional gambler who was sentenced to a year in prison for running an illegal casino, owned a hotel in the French Alps in Chamonix. Joseph worked there as a young man and became fascinated by mountain climbing.

From April to September 1943 Damiani was a member of Jeunesse et Montagne (Youth and Mountain) in Chamonix, part of the Vichy Government youth movement controlled by Pierre Laval.

In February 1944 Damiani came to Paris and through his father's friend, the LVF leader Simon Sabiani, he joined Jacques Doriot's fascist French Popular Party (PPF). His maternal uncle, Ange Paul Santolini alias "Santos", who ran a restaurant patronized by the Gestapo, and his elder brother, Paul Damiani, a member of the Vichy paramilitary Milice, introduced Joseph into the Pigalle underworld.

In March 1944 Joseph Damiani went to Marseille where he became a member of the German Schutzkorps (SK), an organization which hunted down Service du travail obligatoire - STO (Compulsory Work Service) dodgers. He served as bodyguard to its Marseille chief and took part in many arrests, often blackmailing his victims.

In Lyon, in August 1944, posing as a German police officer along with an accomplice (Orloff, a Gestapo agent who was shot for treason at the Liberation), Damiani blackmailed Joseph Gourentzeig and his brother-in-law Georges Edberg, two Jews who were in hiding. Gourentzeig had bribed a member of the Milice - a friend of Damiani’s – in an attempt to secure his parents' release from a detention camp. They were not freed and Gourentzeig's father, Jacob, was shot by the Germans shortly after, on 21 August 1944, along with 109 Jewish hostages in the Bron (Lyon airport) massacre.

After the Liberation in Paris on 18 May 1945, Joseph Damiani, his brother Paul, Georges Accad, a former Gestapo agent, and Jacques Ménassole, a former member of the Milice wearing a French Army lieutenant's uniform - all posing as Military Intelligence officers - abducted Haïm Cohen, a wine merchant, accusing him of being a black marketeer. He was tortured until he gave them the key to his safe and a check for 105,000 francs. He was then shot and his body thrown into the Seine. Joseph Damiani cashed the check at Barclay's Bank under the identity of "Count J. de Montreuil". ...

Source: Article "José Giovanni" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.

Known for

Acting
2018 Lino Ventura, la part intime Actor Self (archive footage) 59
Average
2003 Claude Sautet or the Invisible Magic Actor Self 59
Average
1963 Symphony for a Massacre Actor Moreau 59
Average

Directing
2001 My Father Saved My Life Directing Director 59
Average
1996 Crime à l'altimètre Directing Director 59
Average
1991 L'irlandaise Directing Director N/A
N/A
1988 My Friend the Traitor Directing Director 59
Average
1985 Among Wolves Directing Director 58
Average
1983 The Ruffian Directing Director 59
Average
1981 Une robe noire pour un tueur Directing Director 58
Average
1979 The Sewers of Paradise Directing Director 59
Average
1976 Boomerang Directing Director 58
Average
1975 The Gypsy Directing Director 59
Average
1973 Two Men in Town Directing Director 61
Fair
1972 The Pariah Directing Director 61
Fair
1971 Where Did Tom Go? Directing Director 59
Average
1971 One Way Ticket Directing Director 58
Average
1970 Last Known Address Directing Director 61
Fair
1968 Birds of Prey Directing Director 59
Average
1967 Law of Survival Directing Director 58
Average

Writing
2014 Two Men in Town Writing Screenplay 58
Average
2007 The Second Wind Writing Dialogue 58
Average
2007 The Second Wind Writing Novel 58
Average
1996 Crime à l'altimètre Writing Writer 59
Average
1983 The Ruffian Writing Novel 59
Average
1983 The Ruffian Writing Writer 59
Average
1981 Une robe noire pour un tueur Writing Writer 58
Average
1979 The Sewers of Paradise Writing Writer 59
Average
1976 Boomerang Writing Writer 58
Average
1975 The Gypsy Writing Novel 59
Average
1975 The Gypsy Writing Screenplay 59
Average
1973 Two Men in Town Writing Dialogue 61
Fair
1973 Two Men in Town Writing Screenplay 61
Fair
1972 The Pariah Writing Writer 61
Fair
1972 The Pariah Writing Novel 61
Fair
1972 The Pariah Writing Author 61
Fair
1971 Where Did Tom Go? Writing Writer 59
Average
1971 One Way Ticket Writing Screenplay 58
Average
1970 Last Known Address Writing Writer 61
Fair
1969 The Sicilian Clan Writing Dialogue 65
Fair
1969 The Sicilian Clan Writing Screenplay 65
Fair
1968 Ho! Writing Novel 59
Average
1968 Birds of Prey Writing Writer 59
Average
1967 The Last Adventure Writing Screenplay 60
Fair
1967 The Last Adventure Writing Novel 60
Fair
1966 Le Deuxième Souffle Writing Writer 63
Fair
1966 To Skin a Spy Writing Writer 58
Average
1966 The Man from Marrakech Writing Writer N/A
N/A
1965 The Wise Guys Writing Dialogue 63
Fair
1965 The Wise Guys Writing Novel 63
Fair
1963 Symphony for a Massacre Writing Writer 59
Average
1963 Rififi in Tokyo Writing Adaptation 59
Average
1963 Rififi in Tokyo Writing Dialogue 59
Average
1961 A Man Named Rocca Writing Dialogue 59
Average
1961 A Man Named Rocca Writing Novel 59
Average
1960 The Big Risk Writing Adaptation 61
Fair
1960 The Big Risk Writing Dialogue 61
Fair
1960 The Big Risk Writing Novel 61
Fair
1960 Le Trou Writing Novel 70
Good
1960 Le Trou Writing Dialogue 70
Good
1960 Le Trou Writing Screenplay 70
Good