Marguerite Germaine Marie Donnadieu (4 April 1914 – 3 March 1996), known as Marguerite Duras, was a French novelist, playwright, screenwriter, essayist, and experimental filmmaker. Her script for the film Hiroshima mon amour (1959) earned her a nomination for Best Original Screenplay at the Academy Awards. Duras was born Marguerite Donnadieu on 4 April 1914, in Gia Định, Cochinchina, French Indochina (now Vietnam). Her parents, Marie (née Legrand, 1877–1956) and Henri Donnadieu (1872–1921), were teachers from France who likely had met at Gia Định High School. They both had previous marriages. Marguerite had two brothers: Pierre, the older, and the younger Paul. Duras' father fell ill and he returned to France, where he died in 1921, when Duras was seven years old. Between 1922 and 1924, the family lived in France while her mother was on administrative leave. They then moved back to French Indochina when she was posted to Phnom Penh followed by Vĩnh Long and Sa Đéc. The family struggled financially, and her mother made a bad investment in an isolated property and area of rice farmland in Prey Nob, a story which was fictionalized in Un barrage contre le Pacifique (The Sea Wall). In 1931, when she was 17, Duras and her family moved to France where she successfully passed the first part of the baccalaureate with the choice of Vietnamese as a foreign language, as she spoke it fluently. Duras returned to Saigon in late 1932 where her mother found a teaching post. There, Marguerite continued her education at the Lycée Chasseloup-Laubat and completed the second part of the baccalaureate, specializing in philosophy. In autumn 1933, Duras moved to Paris, graduating with a degree in public law in 1936. At the same time, she took classes in mathematics. She continued her education, earning a diplôme d'études supérieures (DES) in public law and, later, in political economy. After finishing her studies in 1937, she found employment with the French government at the Ministry of the Colonies. In 1939, she married the writer Robert Antelme, whom she had met during her studies. During World War II, from 1942 to 1944, Duras worked for the Vichy government in an office that allocated paper quotas to publishers and in the process operated a de facto book-censorship system. She then became an active member of the PCF (the French Communist Party) and a member of the French Resistance as a part of a small group that also included François Mitterrand, who later became President of France and remained a lifelong friend of hers. Duras' husband, Antelme, was deported to Buchenwald in 1944 for his involvement in the Resistance, and barely survived the experience (weighing on his release, according to Duras, just 38 kg, or 84 pounds). She nursed him back to health, but they divorced once he recovered. In 1943, when publishing her first novel, she began to use the surname Duras, after the town that her father came from, Duras, Lot-et-Garonne. In 1950, her mother returned to France from Indochina, wealthy from property investments and from the boarding school she had run. ... Source: Article "Marguerite Duras" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA.
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Biography from TMDB.
- April 4, 1914
- March 3, 1996 (aged 81)
- Gia Định, Vietnam
- Writer, director and actor
- 10 on MovieCove · 58 credits in all
What are Marguerite Duras' films like?
Across their 9 MovieCove titles with a thematic analysis, their films lean Survival and Bonds.
Genres
Their MovieCove films by primary genre. The badge is the typical Midcredits score of the genre's films, the median percentile; an up arrow marks a genre at or above their average across these genres.
Themes
What they feel like to watch
Ironic 0 · Wry 0 · Earnest 9
Light 0 · Serious 2 · Dark 7
Grounded 0 · Stylized 5 · Heightened 4
Gentle 2 · Charged 5 · Intense 2
Steady 7 · Shifting 2 · Whiplash 0
Straight-faced 9 · Some laughs 0 · Funny 0
Slow burn 9 · Even-paced 0 · Relentless 0
Casual 1 · Engaged 6 · Full focus 2
A split, not a type: Easy watch 1 · Affecting 3 · Heavy 5
Resolved 2 · Open-ended 1 · Ambiguous 6
Roles they play
- Mentoras Elle in The Truck (1977)
Moods and endings
- Bittersweet4
- Ambiguous5
AI-generated from each title's plot synopsis and cast list, with extra plot summaries, reviews and Parents Guide notes for titles the model may not know, and the model's own knowledge of the ones it recognizes. Only analyzed titles count, so this covers part of the filmography; the feel axes count films only for now.
Where can I watch Marguerite Duras' films?
As of October 24, 2026, 4 of their 10 MovieCove titles stream on a subscription or free service, most on Tubi (2).
Subscription and free streaming for Marguerite Duras' titles on MovieCove; rent and buy are not counted. Titles are listed by Midcredits score, highest first, at most 12 per service; a dashed chip is a producer credit or a minor one, such as a thanks. A service opens the browse page, which counts movies only, so its number can differ.
Filmography
58 credits, 10 with a MovieCove page; 39 appearances as themselves are hidden until asked for.
Writing (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2023)
Azuro (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2022)
Suzanna Andler(2021)
Midcredits score: 11th percentile of all films
One Day at the Sea (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2020)
Drifters of a shadowy dream (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2018)
Memoir of War(2017)
Midcredits score: 52nd percentile of all films
A Stormy Summer Night (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2015)
The Sea Wall(2008)
Midcredits score: 40th percentile of all films
Half Past Ten (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2008)
Hiroshima: The Time of Return (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2005)
The Afternoon of Mr. Andesmas (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2004)
Agatha (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(2004)
The Malady of Death (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1994)
The Lover(1992)
Midcredits score: 71st percentile of all films
Savannah Bay (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1989)
The Children (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1985)
The Malady of Death (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1985)
Per un viaggio in Italia (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1984)
Roman Dialogue (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1983)
En rachâchant (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1982)
L’homme atlantique (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1981)
Agatha and the Limitless Readings (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1981)
La bête dans la jungle (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1981)
Le Navire Night (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1979)
Aurélia Steiner (Melbourne) (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1979)
Aurélia Steiner (Vancouver) (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1979)
Césarée (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1978)
Les Mains négatives (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1978)
Music (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1978)
Baxter, Vera Baxter (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1977)
The Truck(1977)
Midcredits score: 65th percentile of all films
Entire Days in the Trees (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1977)
Cygne I (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1976)
Son nom de Venise dans Calcutta désert (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1976)
Gaumont-Palace (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1976)
Henry James Stories (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1976)
India Song (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1975)
Woman of the Ganges (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1974)
Nathalie Granger (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1973)
Jaune, Le Soleil (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1971)
Destroy, She Said (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1969)
La Musica (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1969)
The Square (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1967)
La Musica (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1967)
Days in the Trees (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1967)
Midcredits score: 46th percentile of all films
10:30 P.M. Summer(1966)
Midcredits score: 53rd percentile of all films
La Voleuse (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1966)
Mademoiselle(1966)
Midcredits score: 80th percentile of all films
The Moment of Peace (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1965)
The Wednesday Play (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1964)
Sans merveille (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1964)
Dark Night, Calcutta (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1964)
The Square (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1961)
The Long Absence(1961)
Midcredits score: 78th percentile of all films
Seven Days… Seven Nights (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1960)
Hiroshima Mon Amour(1959)
Midcredits score: 96th percentile of all films
This Angry Age (not in the MovieCove catalog yet)(1957)
Career shape
A full career of 58 titles from 1957 to 2023.
Biggest box office
The Lover (1992)
Highest rated
Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959)
Most popular right now
The Lover (1992)
Film career
- 1973Screen debut· Nathalie Granger
Counts from TMDB across their full career, self appearances out; a title counts in every role they held on it. The ring is the typical Midcredits score (the median percentile) of the role's titles that are on MovieCove, shown from 5 scored.
How do Marguerite Duras' films land?
Their typical MovieCove film has a Midcredits score in the 59th percentile, the median of all 10; across their 9 films with reception data, the typical film sits in the 54th percentile for acclaim.
- 75th and up3
- 50th to 74th4
- 25th to 49th2
- Below 25th1
Shape of the crowd
4 of their 10 titles are Crowd Pleasers.
- Universally Loved1
- Cult Classic1
- Crowd Pleaser4
- Mixed4
Reviewers score the dialogue 51/100 and the plot and story 41/100 in their films, across 8 reviewed titles. The element that speaks to their work as a writer.
Percentiles are each film's standing among all films on MovieCove; the typical film is the median, so one outlier cannot drag it. Percentiles and reviewer scores count the films IMDb credits them on, for now; the Midcredits score bands, the shape of the crowd and the two cards count their MovieCove titles, shows included (a show ranked among shows), appearances as themselves left out. A descriptor is the shape of a title's IMDb rating distribution against the catalog; "most divisive" needs a spread wider than half of all titles, and a card names only a principal credit: a craft role, and on a show a crew role or a run of episodes, never a courtesy credit or a one-off guest spot.
Who does Marguerite Duras work with?
People who share at least 2 of Marguerite Duras' MovieCove titles, grouped by what they did on them; Jeanne Moreau shares the most, 2.
Actors
- Jeanne MoreauShared titles: The Lover (1992), The Sailor from Gibraltar (1967)See all 2 shared titles with Jeanne Moreau
Composers and editors
- Georges DelerueShared titles: The Long Absence (1961), Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959)See all 2 shared titles with Georges Delerue
- Jasmine ChasneyShared titles: The Long Absence (1961), Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959)See all 2 shared titles with Jasmine Chasney
Mixed roles
- Henri ColpiShared titles: The Long Absence (1961), Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959)See all 2 shared titles with Henri Colpi
