>Jean Cocteau was born in Maisons-Laffite, Yvelines, once a small village near Paris, on July 5th, 1889. During his life time Cocteau dabbled in nearly every art-as a poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, boxing manager, playwright, artist and filmmaker-but always considered himself a poet. He also created sculpture, saying 'I have always dreamed of being an archaeologist and as I am not, I try to make what I would have liked to find underground.' Being so involved in the creative arts his circle of friends was broad and included Pablo Picasso, Jean Hugo, Jean Marais, Henri Bernstein, Édith Piaf, and Raymond Radiguet.

>Cocteau did not direct his first film, The Blood of a Poet (1930), until he was forty years old and did not make another film until Beauty and the Beast (1946) sixteen years later at age 57. Cocteau's films, most of which he both wrote and directed, were particularly important in introducing Surrealism into French cinema and influenced to a certain degree the upcoming French New Wave genre. Today he is best known for his novel Les enfants terribles (1929), and the films Les parents terribles (1948), Beauty and the Beast (1946), and Orpheus (1950).

>"Film will only become an art when its materials are as inexpensive as pencil and paper."