The Restless and the Damned
The Restless and the Damned (also known as L'Ambitieuse) is a 1959 French-Australian film co produced by Lee Robinson. It was shot on location in Tahiti and the Tuamotu Islands. There are French and English-language versions. Synopsis. In Tahiti, an ambitious woman, Dominique, promotes the fortunes of her husband, George, by extracting money from George's family to finance his operations and seducing a prospective business partner. But when George decides to leave her for another woman, Claire, she tries to kill him. Production. The film was shot in late 1958. Originally Lee  Robinson was to direct the English-language version but after a few days Yves Allégret directed both. Rafferty and Robinson contributed £40,000 of the film's budget, coming from hire of studio facilities to two films shot in Tahiti and their involvement in several episodes of the US documentary series, "High Adventure". Edmond O'Briens fee was more than $200,000. He was cast on the strength of his performance in "The Girl Can't Help It"("it was considered a comedy of importance" said Dorfman) and his Oscar. The film was also known as "The Ambitious". Release. The film was  a box office failure and did not achieve cinema release in England, the United States and Australia and ended the feature film partnership of Chips Rafferty and Lee Robinson. It was sold to American TV under the title "The Climbers".