Benoît Jacquot is a young cinemagoer of 17 years old when he starts his career in the film industry as the assistant of director Bernard Borderie on the "Angélique" series. In the early 1970's, he shoots documlentaries for television ("Jacques Lacan psychanalyse" I & II) as well as adaptations of Kafka or Blanchot. Assistant of Marguerite Duras on "Nathalie Granger" and "India Song", he chooses for his first long feature, "L' Assassin musicien" in 1975, to adapt a novel by Dostoievski. The spare direction and lifeless diction of the actors seems to make of him the heir of Bresson, impression that gets confirmed in his second feature, "Les Enfants du placard".