In 1951, French writer Jean Genet presented a screenplay called Les Rêves Interdits/L'Autre Versant du Rêve to actress Anouk Aimée as a wedding gift. He then sold the rights three times without telling her. According to Tony Richardson (A Taste of Honey, Look Back in Anger) who ended up directing the film, Genet came to London and worked on the script for two hours every day, until Richardson made the mistake of complimenting him on his reliability. This assault on his rebel identity was apparently unbearable and Genet disappeared the next day for good. Eventually the script was reworked by Marguerite Duras as Mademoiselle, with Jeanne Moreau in the title role. 

In its final form, Mademoiselle tells the story of a repressed schoolteacher who whose seemingly motiveless acts of violence (poisoning cows, opening floodgates and burning down a barn) create divides in a close-knit French village. Sexually transfixed by itinerant Italian woodcutter Manou, she takes out her frustrations on his young son Bruno, by emotionally abusing him in class. But when she finally acts out her fantasies, her response incites the villagers into taking extreme action. A notoriously difficult shoot, Mademoiselle was filmed consecutively with The Sailor From Gibraltar, another collaboration between Richardson, Moreau, and Duras.