José Giovanni

Personal Info

Known For Writer

Gender Male

Birthday 1923-06-22

Deathday 2004-04-24 (80 years old)

Place of Birth Paris, France

Also Known As Jose Giovanni, Joseph Damiani

José Giovanni

Biography

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

Writer

2014
Two Men in Town

as Screenplay

2007
The Second Wind

as Dialogue

2007
1996
1983
The Ruffian

as Writer

1983
The Ruffian

as Novel

1977
Der Alte

as Writer

1976
Boomerang

as Writer

1975
The Gypsy

as Novel

1975
The Gypsy

as Screenplay

1973
Two Men in Town

as Screenplay

1973
Two Men in Town

as Dialogue

1972
The Pariah

as Writer

1972
The Pariah

as Novel

1972
The Pariah

as Author

1971
One Way Ticket

as Screenplay

1971
1970
1969
The Sicilian Clan

as Screenplay

1969
The Sicilian Clan

as Dialogue

1968
Birds of Prey

as Writer

1968
Ho!

as Novel

1967
The Last Adventure

as Screenplay

1967
1966
To Skin a Spy

as Writer

1966
1965
The Wise Guys

as Dialogue

1965
The Wise Guys

as Novel

1963
Rififi in Tokyo

as Adaptation

1963
Rififi in Tokyo

as Dialogue

1963
1961
A Man Named Rocca

as Dialogue

1961
1960
The Big Risk

as Novel

1960
The Big Risk

as Adaptation

1960
The Big Risk

as Dialogue

1960
Le Trou

as Novel

1960
Le Trou

as Screenplay

1960
Le Trou

as Dialogue

Director

2001
1996
1991
L'irlandaise

as Director

1988
1985
Among Wolves

as Director

1983
The Ruffian

as Director

1979
1977
Der Alte

as Director

1976
Boomerang

as Director

1975
The Gypsy

as Director

1973
Two Men in Town

as Director

1972
The Pariah

as Director

1971
One Way Ticket

as Director

1971
Where Did Tom Go?

as Director

1970
Last Known Address

as Director

1968
Birds of Prey

as Director

1967
Law of Survival

as Director

Actor