Jean-Marie Straub (; 8 January 1933 — 20 November 2022) and Danièle Huillet (; 1 May 1936 – 9 October 2006) were a duo of French filmmakers who made two dozen films between 1963 and 2006. Their films are noted for their rigorous, intellectually stimulating style and radical, communist politics. While both were French, they worked mostly in Germany and Italy. From the Clouds to the Resistance (1979) and Sicilia! (1999) are among the duo's best regarded works. Biography Straub, who was born in Metz, met Paris-born Huillet as a student in 1954. Straub was involved in the Parisian cinephile community at the time. He was friends with Francois Truffaut and contributed to his publication Cahiers du Cinéma, although Truffaut refused to publish Straub's more inflammatory writings. He worked as an assistant to the film director Jacques Rivette on the 1956 film A Fool's Mate. He also worked in Paris as an assistant to Abel Gance, Jean Renoir, Robert Bresson and Alexandre Astruc. The pair later emigrated to Germany so that Straub could avoid military service in Algeria. Straub spent his first few years researching Bach. Huillet had initially planned to make ethnographic films but eventually assisted Straub on his projects. In 1963, they made Machorka-Muff, an 18-minute short based on a Heinrich Böll story and their first collaboration. Their next film, the 55-minute Not Reconciled, was also a Böll adaptation. They did not make a full-length feature until 1968's Chronicle of Anna Magdalena Bach, after which they made films at a fairly even rate, completing a feature every 2–3 years. The production of the Chronicle of Anna Magdalena Bach was very tedious. The struggle for funding lasted for ten years, until 1967. In 1968, they also made a short film starring Rainer Werner Fassbinder and his theatre troupe called The Bridegroom, the Actress and the Pimp. In the mid 1970s, they began producing films in Italy. Increasingly, they began splitting their time between Germany and Italy, as well as frequently collaborating with French and British producers. Straub and Huillet lived together for most of their lives. They had no children. Huillet died of cancer in Cholet on 9 October 2006, aged 70. Straub died on 20 November 2022, at the age of 89. Style and content All of the films of Straub and Huillet are based on other works: novels, operas, plays, and less conventional source materials, such as