Nouveau riche

In spite of a very poor rating, this film is really a killer! By far Jean Dreville’s most important film as well as one of the best Charles Vanel’s performances. First intended for Raimu, it seems that Vanel was finally a better choice and anyway if you give this movie a chance, he’s gonna blow your mind. Lord! What an actor!

MOnsieur Lechat is a nouveau riche: he epitomizes the American dream turned French. A self made man, he worked his way up and now he lives in luxury in a desirable mansion where his missus (who tells her daughter that if there are poor people it’s because they are lazy) is ill-at-ease (it’s so huge, I cannot get used to it). He’s completely devoid of compassion, a heart of stone and a desire to push people out of his way, a smug smile every time he puts one of his business’ colleagues down. He feels no remorse when he learns a man committed suicide whereas he could have saved him effortlessly.

“Business is business” is Octave Mirbeau’s play masterfully transferred to the screen. Monsieur Lechat makes all Chabrol’s bourgeois seem nice by comparison.

Monsieur Lechat’s next victim is to be the Marquis de Porcellet (Marquis of Piglet). Now the bourgeois have replaced the nobles at the top, and there is no room there for the ruined aristocrats except… if they let their son marries the wealthy businessman’s daughter. For, like Monsieur Jourdain, in Molière’s “Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme”, Monsieur Lechat wants his daughter to be a Marquise (and maybe a duchess). Unlike Jourdain, Lechat is no idiot and he kills two birds with one stone: he enters an obsolete world which retained in the first half of the twentieth century some prestige; and he humiliates a man whose pride, honor, duty and moral values are his reasons to live. But if Mirbeau shows some sympathy for the Marquis (and finally avenges him), he does believe that all those values are doomed and fast becoming things of bygone days.

“Les Affaires Sont les Affaires”, released in the darkest year of the Occupation is almost a desperate work: only the tycoon’s daughter, by breaking off communication with her family ,may mean hope for the future. Her lover is a scientist the discoveries of whom the daddy wanted to take over.

1.16GB | 1h 16m | 712×572 | mkv

https://nitro.download/view/A50B4312F232B53/Les.affaires.sont.les.affaires.1942.DVDRip.x264-FuFu.mkv
https://nitro.download/view/873F3851FAB8B6D/Les.affaires.sont.les.affaires.1942.DVDRip.x264-FuFu.eng05.srt

Language:French
Subtitles:English,French HoH

The post Jean Dréville – Les affaires sont les affaires (1942) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

Synopsis
The Private Life of an Actor was the English-language title bestowed upon Sacha Guitry’s first postwar feature, Le Comédien. The film recounts the life and loves of Guitry’s actor/father Lucien, with Guitry playing both himself and his dad. Most of the story takes place either on-stage or in the dressing room, satirically emphasizing the wide schism between an actor’s public and private life. Adding to the Pirandellian ambience of the project is Guitry’s wife, Catherine (Lana Marconi), cast as one of Lucien’s various mistresses.

1.10GB | 1h 31m | 640×480 | avi

https://nitro.download/view/A983F21891D908E/Le.comedien.1948.DVDRip.XviD.avi

Language(s):French
Subtitles:None

The post Sacha Guitry – Le comédien AKA The Private Life of an Actor (1948) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

Synopsis
Paris, 1817. The wealthy Countess Ferraud is distressed when she begins to receive letters from her husband, Colonel Chabert, who was reported to have died during the Napoleonic wars ten years before. After an attempt to have him committed to a lunatic asylum fails, the now destitute Chabert appeals to a lawyer Derville to help restore his identity and his fortune. The Countess has since remarried and has no intention of surrendering the wealth she inherited from Chabert…

Quote:
This superlative adaptation of Balzac’s great novel was one of a number of prestigious film productions made in France during the Occupation (1940-1944). Extraordinary that such a dark period in French history could unleash so much creativity and result in so many magnificent works of cinema, of which this is a fine example. The film has everything you could expect of a quality historical drama – a great cast, lavish sets and the most beautifully atmospheric cinematographic style.

Quote:
The mesmerising high contrast black and white photography is particularly effective at evoking the mood of psychological turmoil and conflict which propels the narrative. There are also some nice expressionist touches which suggest a dangerous note of insanity in the two protagonists – Chabert and his estranged wife. The part of Chabert is played with great feeling and conviction by Raimu, one of French cinema’s greatest acting talents, an actor whose ability for arousing genuine pathos is virtually unsurpassed. His co-star in this film is Marie Bell, another highly regarded actor who manages to bring psychological depth and humanity to her portrayals of complex women.

Quote:
As with many French films of this period, it is possible to interpret the film as a subtle allegory of France under occupation. There is an obvious parallel between France under Nazi control in the 1940s and France under the restored Bourbon Dynasty in 1814, following the removal of the Emperor Napoleon. Colonel Chabert, a supporter of the republican ideal and loyal follower of Napoleon, the only truly moral character in the story, personifies the nation that has had her identity stolen. His determination to hold onto his beliefs, whatever it may cost, has a clear message for supporters of the resistance movement: do not submit! Just as the restored monarchy was swept aside later in the 19th Century, so one day the tyrannous Nazi régime will be brought to an end, and France will be free, her former greatness restored.

Quote:
This film was originally to have been directed by Jacques Becker, who was then a fairly inexperienced director. When Becker fell out with Raimu, the role of director fell to René Le Hénaff, who had a few pretty modest films under his belt. In place of this film, Becker directed Goupi mains rouges (1943), the film that established his reputation. Raimu would only appear in two further films before his sudden, premature death in 1946. In 1994, Yves Angelo directed another adaptation of Colonel Chabert, which starred Gérard Depardieu, Fanny Ardant and Fabrice Luchini.

1.36 GiB | 1:38:01 | 640 x 480 | avi

https://nitro.download/view/F0FE63EE41BFD9A/Le.colonel.Chabert.1943.DVDRip.XviD.avi

Language(s):French
Subtitles:None

The post René Le Hénaff – Le colonel Chabert (1943) first appeared on Cinema of the World.