French screen legend Brigitte Bardot has opened up about the profound darkness she has faced throughout her life, including multiple suicide attempts, in a candid new documentary about her iconic career and personal struggles.
A Life Shadowed by Sadness
Now 91, Bardot narrates the upcoming film, titled simply Bardot, which offers an intimate portrait authorised by the actress and her team. In it, she describes the depression she continues to endure daily. "Every morning I wake up and I am sad," she reveals, according to The Times.
The documentary delves into the intense pressures of her fame, which began when she was just a teenager. Bardot explains how her rapid ascent to global sex symbol status in the 1960s led to deep loneliness and a struggle with her public image. This turmoil culminated in at least two documented attempts to take her own life in her youth.
"I was taking my own life and I was saved by a miracle," Bardot states in the film, reflecting on those desperate chapters.
From Sex Kitten to Animal Activist
Bardot's career was meteoric. After appearing on the cover of Elle magazine at 15, she made her film breakthrough in 1952. Her role in And God Created Woman in 1956, directed by her then-husband Roger Vadim, became the highest-grossing foreign film in the US at the time, despite censorship cuts.
Her provocative image sparked moral outrage; American theatre managers were arrested, New York priests advised against her films, and the Vatican condemned her. Yet, the controversy only fuelled her fame. She starred in over 45 films and recorded more than 70 songs before retiring from acting in 1973 at the age of 39.
Since leaving the spotlight, Bardot has dedicated her life to animal welfare, founding the Brigitte Bardot Foundation in 1986. This cause now defines her legacy more than her film career. "I don’t care if people remember me. What I would really like is for people to remember the respect we owe to animals," she asserts in the documentary.
She adds, "The more I advance in my life, the more I fear humans. I’m more animal than human."
A Complex Personal History
The documentary also touches on Bardot's tumultuous personal life. She was married four times and had a son, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, with her second husband in 1960. Bardot has been openly candid about her lack of maternal feelings, once calling her unborn child a "cancerous tumour." Her son was raised by his father's family, and the pair were estranged for many years before reconciling.
Her romantic life included liaisons with notable figures like singer Sacha Distel and actor Warren Beatty. Serge Gainsbourg famously wrote the sexually explicit song Je T'aime Moi Non Plus for her after their affair.
The documentary Bardot, which screened at the Cannes Film Festival, is set for release in French cinemas on December 3. Director Alain Berliner has described Bardot as a "very mysterious person," whose own narration was key to telling her authentic story.
