1941-1950

From frenchfilms.org

Georges Simenon’s 1940 novel Les Inconnus dans la maison is a brooding study in social breakdown and youth disaffection that contains a powerful critique of western society of the 1940s. The same can equally be said of Henri Decoin’s magnificent film adaptation, one of the earliest and most successful attempts to bring Simenon’s bleak, melancholic world to the big screen. This was the second film that Decoin made for the German-run film company Continental-Films during the Nazi Occupation of France and it could hardly be more different in tone and subject from his first, the American-style romantic comedy Premier rendez-vous (1941).Read More »

Synopsis:
No one would think that Manuel Ismora, an esteemed society photographer, is an audacious thief and con artist. The newspapers are ?lled with accounts of Ismora’s criminal exploits, which involve the fraudulent sale of a château and the theft of some valuable jewels, but the police are slow in bringing him to justice. Instead, it is Gabriel Dupon, a modest button salesman who bears a remarkable physical resemblance to Imora, who ends up being taken into custody. Positively identi?ed by Imora’s many victims, Dupon is branded a criminal, and even when he is released by the police through lack of evidence, his reputation is in tatters.Read More »

STORYLINE:
A man is murdered, and the detective tries to find out whodunit. But the house he’s investigating is decidedly haunted, and he never knows just what’s round the next corner…Read More »

Quote:
“Wicked” Lily Bishop joins a wagon train to California, led by Michael Fabian and Johnny Trumbo, but news of the Gold Rush scatters the train. When Johnny and Michael finally arrive, Lily is rich from her saloon and storekeeper (former slaver) Pharaoh Coffin is bleeding the miners dry. But worse troubles are ahead: California is inching toward statehood, and certain people want to make it their private empire.Read More »

Quote:
Tough torch singer Petey Brown, visiting her family, finds a nest of troubles: her sister, brother, and the neighbor’s wife are involved in various ways with shady nightclub owner Nicky Toresca. Sexy Petey has what it takes to handle Nicky, but then she meets San Thomas, formerly great jazz pianist now on the skids, and falls for him hard.Read More »

Synopsis:
After murdering his mistress and being hunted by the authorities in France, Pierre (Jean Gabin) stows away aboard a ship bound for Genoa, Italy. Though he’s immediately robbed after arriving, things look up for Pierre when he meets Cecchina (Vera Talchi), a kind-hearted young girl who introduces him to her mother, Marta (Isa Miranda). Pierre and Marta fall in love, but the French police are closing in on him and the new couple may not have much time left.Read More »

1933, the bosses of a large German chemical concern pave the way for Hitler’s rise to power: Thus begins the story line of the feature film Der Rat der Götter (The Council of the Gods), which deals with the history of I.G. Farben. The film adheres throughout to the Communist theory of fascism. Hitler is largely unidimensional: a creature of capital. Thus the story continues: While the directors assist Germany’s military buildup, they continue to cultivate their business dealings with the U.S. company Standard Oil in order to have joint control of the world market.Read More »

Quote:

Undeniably one of Hollywood’s greatest actresses, Katharine Hepburn nonetheless only had one voice. She used it to massive effect but anything that really warranted an utterly different accent tended to make her look horribly miscast. Of all the great actors she was the one who seemed to be horribly miscast most often, whether it be as a Chinese peasant girl, a queen of Scotland or a backwoods hillbilly. Here, playing the nineteenth century pianist and composer Clara Schumann, I expected another horrible miscasting, but found that the film’s very human story utterly engaging regardless what accents are brought to bear.Read More »

1933, the bosses of a large German chemical concern pave the way for Hitler’s rise to power: Thus begins the story line of the feature film Der Rat der Götter (The Council of the Gods), which deals with the history of I.G. Farben. The film adheres throughout to the Communist theory of fascism. Hitler is largely unidimensional: a creature of capital. Thus the story continues: While the directors assist Germany’s military buildup, they continue to cultivate their business dealings with the U.S. company Standard Oil in order to have joint control of the world market. Some directors now carve out careers with the Nazis, while the engineer Dr. Scholz, who comes from a working-class family, has nothing but scientific progress in mind. Read More »