Charlotte Rampling: The Look

Iconic screen siren Charlotte Rampling turns the camera on fashion photographer Peter Lindbergh in this clip from director Angelina Maccarone’s new documentary Charlotte Rampling: The Look. The film unfolds as a series of thematic vignettes, in which the actress candidly discusses her life and career with friends: such as ‘Age’, in which she drinks tea and meditates on beauty with Paul Auster on his moored tug boat on the Hudson river; ‘Taboo’, where she revisits her infamous photo shoot with Juergen Teller; and ‘Exposure’ with Lindbergh. “Charlotte was a breaker of taboos at a time when it was not fashionable. It took courage,” says Maccarone of her striking subject. “She dared to challenge the concept of how women should behave.” Rampling’s captivating, complex beauty has transfixed directors and cinema-goers since she first appeared on the screen in London in the early 1960s. Her famous gaze, betraying a fiercely intellectual sensuality, led her to work with the likes of Woody Allen (Stardust Memories), Luchino Visconti (The Damned), Sidney Lumet (The Verdict) and François Ozon (Swimming Pool), often portraying deeply sexual and disturbed characters—as evident in poignant excerpts sprinkled throughout The Look. Always remaining private and maintaining a mythical status, Rampling is achingly vulnerable yet always strong and powerful in Maccarone’s film. “Charlotte never disclosed her secret and now we live in a culture of confession that lacks secrets,” says the director. “We tried to perform the paradox: Exposure without giving away the mystery.”

Charlotte Rampling: The Look opens on November 4 in New York City, at the Lincoln Plaza and Cinema Village.