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Reviews
Ils sont dans les vignes... (1952)
Koku-Kolu he says .
A great burst of laughter shakes the Burgundian village when the inhabitants learn of the creation of an anti-alcohol league. Pimpin Desbordes, heavy drinker and merry prankster, thus goes to war against the initiative of his brother, the prudish commissioner Desbordes, with the support of all the winegrowers in the surrounding area. As for the daughter of the local tavern keeper, she gives her heart and her hand - the heart has its reasons - to the kind Pierre Morau, representative of a tonic drink, the koku-kolu and the whole village sinks into an euphoric drunkenness.
A vehicle for singer Line Renaud ,whose husband ,Louis Gasté ,wrote the score for it is almost a musical; the action takes place circa 1885 ,for the President of the Republic is Jules Grévy ; the spoof on Coke (Koku-kolu) is odd for the American soda was unknown in France at the time :it appeared in 1933 and became really popular in the fifties and mainly in the sixties ;but it provides the movie with one of its wittiest lines when Suzanne Dehelly asks: "shall we use it to do our brasses?".The story is a heavy-handed farce but the songs are pleasant: the arrival of the soda rep in the village, the duet with him and Renaud (plus a radio set)which in its modest way, predates Demy's sung dialogues in "les parapluies de Cherbourg"; the infectious "le jupon de Lison", sung in a washing-place .
But to try to replace wine by a soda which makes everybody pucker,it's an almost impossible task in Burgundy .
Une larme dans l'océan (1973)
A tear in the ocean
In the Poland of the Warsaw Ghetto in 1942, a Catholic aristocrat count sells part of his treasures to form a resistance against the Nazis and protect a Jewish community divided into two movements: the first refuses to arm itself so as not to behave like the tyrant and the second wants to take up arms and fight. With the relentless hunt and military power of the Nazis, they are aware that faced with these two choices, their chance "We don't want to savof survival is almost futile.... However, another drama comes to interfere with the first: some of the count's supporters are hostile to this outstretched hand because their resistance is that led to save Poland and not against Adolf Hitler's determination to decimate the Jews...
Made on a shoestring budget , filmed in Alsace ,without any known actor (only Chabrol's fans will recognize Dominique Zardi,one of his minor figures),the film in itself is a miracle: the final uprising was probably impossible to film ,considering the paucity of the means and is replaced by genuine photographs taken during the massacre.
But it does not matter for the gist of the story is what happens before ; do they join the resistant fighters or do they accept the Eternal who moves in mysterious ways and become martyrs? In its own way,the movie predates Xavier Beauvois's "des hommes et des dieux"in which Catholic priests accepted the sacrifice .In "une larme dans l'océan" (a tear in the ocean ,what a sublime title!) , opinions differ :some Jews said that's the way the Eternal planned it and resigned themselves to their fate , but others,such as doctor Rubin and Wolyna tsadik's son stood with the rebels and began a desperate fight,lost in advance ..
We do not want to save our lives. No one will get out of here alive. We want to save human dignity ."
Arie Wilner (pseudonym Jurek ), soldier.
La richesse du loup (2012)
Was she none the wiser?
Olaf has disappeared. He only left Marie, his partner, a box of cassettes containing a hundred hours of rushes (the last nine years of his life) as well as a notebook... Marie then decides to "investigate". Day after day, she watches the images, fragments of life, and tries to reconstruct the journey of the man she loves in order to better understand his departure.
In it form,"La richesse du loup" " may put off many viewers because nothing really happens :it's slices of life ; there are hints at WW2 and the Algeria war ; Olaf must have hated his " géniteur" (sire, parent) ,never his mate who tells the story in voice over uses the word "father" .
Director Damien Odoul wrote:" Rich Is the Wolf is not a film about a dying world. It doesn't tell the story, too simple and so very in tune with the times, of an era that is unable to meet its challenges. This is a trip on the dimensions of a vast world that is still filled with desire, certainly manhandled but always present."
However ,this is essentially an experimental movie and its meaning may elude many a viewer.
Der Fuchs (2022)
A new petit prince
Based on a true story ,the movie is decidedly off the beaten track and depicts the friendship of a soldier and a fox ;taking place when the German army was triumphant , for defeating the French and the English was just a pushover after Poland ; the vengeful spirit plays a prominent part and the fathers will be proud of their sons' prowess which redeems their 1918 humiliation;it was the same despicable spirit in France after 1870. However when the movie ends ,when the Germans want to celebrate Xmas in Moscow , they should have remembered Napoleon's Berezina .
In a world gone mad , the young soldier does not seem to care about the big victories ;the more I know men,the more I love dogs (or foxes) seems to be his motto though he remains a good soldier, not a rebellious mind ;one must note that the superiors were lenient when he did not join his mates (he's not really looked upon as a deserter). The scenes with the French woman provides the movie with its low point :there does not seem to have the slightest problem of communication between them ,which is a little unlikely all the same .
One scene at the beginning -when the little boy is taken away from his family ,"for his own good" -echoes to one of the final scenes ,that of the fox running behind the vehicle ;both scenes are harrowing.and will drive you to tears.
Animals remain friends to men when they fight each others : "der Fuchs " belongs to a genre which includes Spielberg's "war horse"(2011) and the French movie starring Fernandel "la vache et le prisonnier" (1959)(the cow and I ", itself based on a true story)
L'inévitable M. Dubois (1943)
I'll do it my way.
Hélène Mareuil is a businesswoman who firmly and competently runs a luxury perfume factory in the south of France. One day, by accident, she knocks down Claude Dubois, a painter who was riding his bike, with her car. Dubois tries to seduce the young woman whose fantasy is not his strong point ; to achieve his ends, he will have to multiply the most subtle tricks and stratagems.
Pierre Billon was an estimable director ,too often unfairly forgotten ; when he was given good material he was able to make interesting works ("Vautrin" " L'homme au chapeau rond" "Ruy Blas " "Agnès de Rien " )
"l'inévitable Monsieur Dubois" imitates the American comedies ,"New -York Miami"style, the film which lent credibility to the genre ; not on a par with them, it's nevertheless a pleasant ,sometimes funny comedy ; "I' thought I'd met a woman ,and actually it was a factory ";of course the story is eminently predictable , but it was a huge success in the occupation days (released in 1943); to show a successful businesswoman was able to cheer up the audiences ;but do not panic, it's not women's lib yet :the second part reverses the roles,although the last word (concerning Ramirez ) is hers .Well acted .
Par ordre du tsar (1954)
Rhapsody in blues.
Carolyn de Sayn was married at the age of sixteen, against her will, to Prince Wittgeinstein, who was much older than her. A few years later, she met Frantz Liszt, whose fame had already conquered all of Europe. Taking advantage of her husband's absence, the young woman invited the musician to her estate in Woronince. When Frantz confessed his love for her, she gave up fighting her own feelings any longer..
The follow-up to the dreaded "il est minuit docteur Schweizer" ,in André Haguet's lousy filmography , it also features historical characters ,for the principal is Liszt and it also features Wagner and fleetingly Francis -Joseph and wife Elizabeth (Sissi); oddly,in spite of the title ("by order of the czar" ) ,the monarch does not appear at all and his orders are nowhere to be heard except in the last third .Co-production with West Germany ,thus the budget was able to afford color , this is a mess , with a cock and bull story, and with one exception (Michel Simon as the libidinous hubby ) a mediocre cast .Colette Marchand is a silly goose and Jacques François totally bland ;thus absolutely no chemistry between them; also filmed in Germany as "Ungarishe Rhapsodie ";this work is performed live in a village with people dancing ;appearance of Richard Wagner is thoroughly ill-placed .Much money for nothing at all.
Ils sont vivants (2021)
Alive she cried
The director ,whose film is his first effort,resumes a subject Philippe Lioret had already broached in his absolutely remarkable "welcome' (2009); based on a true story ,it's the (relatively) optimistic side of 'welcome " :like in Lioret's superior movie, France ,par excellence the country of refugees (particularly political refugees),is shown in a less-than-flattering light than usual;on the other hand ,one can wonder whether the United Kingdom is really the promised land as it appears in the film. In Calais ,people who gave a shelter to illegal migrants were actually troubled by the Police .The last lines tell us so.
Béatrice is a widow and she's devoted to her thankless job , an auxiliary nurse ...The facts that she gives away all her late husband's clothes to the refugees indicates she wants to live with the living,even though she says it's only to get rid of them ;as usual, Marina Fois ,not your feel-good-movie brilliant careerist , shines in her role of a working-class heroine ;the main flaw of the movie is that it focuses too much on her ,and ,with one exception , reduces the others to foils to her , baddies who do not understand and who want to preserve their "happiness" from this riffraff; the cop agrees to lend her money , but only because it can win her love he has been longing for since the husband's funeral;the scenes with the would be friend also gets in the way ; and the bed scenes are too long,but the director wanted to depict an amour fou .
16 ans (2022)
Wild side story
The film bears more than a distant resemblance to Gerard Blain's "Pierre et Djemilah"(1986),
one of the most pessimistic French works of the eighties. This tragedy was depicted in a Bressonesque way (one thinks of "Mouchette" ). Very short,with a stunning spare of gestures and words,Blain's movie went straight to the heart.
Forget the hackneyed Romeo and Juliet subject which has been used and used and used again ;unlike Blain,Lioret 's style is not bressonesque , but the director remains true to form
Philippe Lioret has not made a bad movie yet ;I would go as far as to write that "Toutes Nos Envies" ,"Je Vais Bien Ne T'en Fais Pas" ,"L'Equipier" "Welcome" or "Tombés Du Ciel"have placed him firmly and definitively among French finest contemporary directors .With "Le Fils De Jean " ,he simply became my favorite contemporary French director,along with Robert Guédiguian .
Both young actors are very good, two lovers overtaken by events ; like in Blain's effort ,the girl comes from a muslim family but this time the boy belongs to the bourgeoisie :hasn't he got a private swimming -pool ?But the stand -out is for me the boy's father :Jean -Pierre Lorit was a remarkable Antoine in a rather so-so miniseries based on Martin Du Gard's "les Thibault" .
The gap between both families would have caused problems but perhaps not insurmountable; and that a simple bottle of wine (fancy wine: Chateau-Margaux!) may trigger such an escalation of violence shows Lioret's talent for story-telling ,in a classic way but with scenes and lines which hit home; the last lines of the movie pack a real wallop and some may find the father's attitude inhuman , but when the pain is so big you feel nothing at all.
Mon mari est merveilleux (1952)
I'd like to live in a beehive .
Claude Chatel, a popular writer, cultivates misanthropy. He imposes his brand image: a hermit living away from the world and noise. A cheeky journalist, Sylvia, takes it upon herself to publish an interview with this savage. She introduces herself as the secretary of Micheline, her best friend, whom she portrays as an unbearable socialite, attracts the good graces of the butler Henri and gradually wins the trust, then the friendship, then the love of Claude.
Featuring the same principals and the same director as "ma femme est formidable", "my husband is wonderful" is the follow-up ,but not a sequel :and for a good reason,vcause there's no husband ,at least till the very last scene which will infuriate the women's lib .
It's an imitation of the American comedies,with Fernand Gravey resembling Clark Gable ;hindsight displays the charms of this light harmless little movie : devoid of coarseness: it features cutting remarks about the snob Parisians ;the writer shuns the jet-set and goes back to his roots in his native Provence where, while writing disagreeable lines about women , he 's also a beekeeper; he draws a wry spicy parallel between the human society and the beehive where the insects never attack their mates .
Les pépées au service secret (1956)
Charlie's angels .
Elvire, Nathalie and Christine, three proven young ladies, are asked by the Secret Service to find coveted papers concerning a new explosive. Introduced into a fearsome environment thanks to female help, they face kidnappings, play double games, strive endlessly, lend helicopters and finally triumph, with smiles on their faces, after a breathtaking fight.
These prehistoric Charlie 's Angels ' first mission (told in "les pépées font la loi" ) proved commercially successful ;thus,presto! A sequel! I have not seen the first effort but the second one is so abysmal I do not feel like watching it! It's a dreaded stodgy mixture of stolen formula which may endanger the whole world, kidnappings, and a final free-for-all which gives this dud the coup de grace. Best avoid.
Monsieur Balboss (1975)
There are many people livin' double lives .
Mr. Balboss dreamed of being a poet but he is a police commissioner. He is a good husband, a good father. He is also this scoundrel who uses all the means that the laws . His taste for the absolute has been disappointed: he needs a witness. He sets his sights on a young homeless man. He traps him, locks him up and then frees him. He forces him to be the spectator of his "acts". He will apprentice the young man. The commissioner will reveal all the tricks of the trade to him. The young man then seeks to know the true nature of the commissioner and to understand the reasons that push him to commit gratuitous and unpunished crime!
Jean Marboeuf's closest relative,in the French cinema is Jean-Pierre Mocky; both displays an. Anarchic side a rather couldn't care less directing , but Mocky's sense of black humor lacks here .
The subject of the man who lives a double life has already been treated ,and many times, in the American film noir and in France, notably Decoin's "le bienfaiteur" (1942) starring Raimu .Here the screenplay is more a succession of sketches in which talented Galabru munches ginger bread or a ham sandwich and which does not add up to something really consistent ; the scene when the superintendent trains his protégé may be intriguing but an absurd editing in the finale is off-putting.
Conduite à gauche (1962)
If I could start over ......
Everything happens in a daydream in a hospital waiting room. While his young wife has just been seriously injured and is undergoing surgery, the husband relives, in his memory, the reality of their recent past, or what he would have liked his marital union to be. At the beginning, this young couple took as their model the famous couple from "Dangerous Liaisons" and their line of conduct: complete freedom allowed to each, as long as they confide in each other about their adventures...
Guy Lefranc's first efforts were certainly promising :"knock" who owed a lot to Jouvet though, "une histoire d 'amour" and "capitaine pantoufle" ;afterward, the slump began.
"Conduite à gauche" showed a tendency to look towards the NV: cult of youth, navel-gazing, loose screenplay ; the story is an interminable flashback , divided into two parts : the first told in the past tense ,the second in the past conditional where the husband thinks about his errors ,how he neglected his wife ;thus involving minimal expenses (same characters, same places).
This is cinema de papa masquerading as NV .It's all the more infuriating since Dany Robin had already been through this kind of movie before : in Julien Duvivier 's masterful "la fête à Henriette" (1952) she lived different lives according to the screenwriters' whims. Avoid Lefranc's poor film and watch this great director's .
Robin's co-star,Marcel Amont is better as a singer than as an actor.
Les patates (1969)
For a few potatoes more.
The sixties were a hard time from all the great directors who worked before the N. V . Autant-Lara's work in this era can be classified into two categories : the commissioned movies ("vive Henri IV Vive l'amour" ,"le comte de Monte Cristo " "le magot de Josepha") and the ones he was anxious to make ,dealing with taboo subjects : A conscientious objector in "tu ne tueras point" (1963) and abortion ("journal (et nouveau ) "journal d'une femme en blanc" (1965-66); so the great rebellious director of "douce" " le diable au corps" and "l'auberge rouge" was still present .
Like his precedent effort "le franciscain de Bourges " (1968) , "les patates ' takes place during the occupation ; comic singer Pierre Perret (who was also capable of deeply moving anti-racist songs as "Lily ") plays the lead and his jovial face fits the atmosphere like a glove .
This is a farce which put off many people at the time , but hindsight shows that his next-to-last movie was his swan song (as for the last ,"Gloria" ,if you can't say something nice...); in occupied France , people living in the country were not as starving as in Paris (as depicted in "la traversée de Paris" ) ,but in the forbidden zone, here les Ardennes , people were not sure to have something to eat when their supply run
out .
Hence the necessity to get potatoes (check the title) ,which ,as the comedy turns to drama , becomes the hero's obsession ; Autant-Lara and his screenwriter Jean Aurenche do not pass over in silence the collaborators who stuff themselves with fine food ,but they also expose the selfishness of the hero , his property instinct hated by his fellow men ; all in all ,he's responsible for the final tragedy .
Le comte de Monte Cristo (1961)
The Dantès redemption.
How many versions of the famous novel are there in the world? Even the "best movie of all time "(sic) ,according to the IMDb users ,"Shawshank redemption", owes a lot to Alexandre Dumas and his count: Andy is Dantès and Red is Faria. Lewis Wallace 'said that "Ben Hur" was inspired by Edmond Dantès' fall and vengeance .And so on and on and on....
In France , the versions considered best were both Robert Vernay's (1942,black and white ,1953,,color) but it seems that it's now overshadowed by the 2024 film featuring Pierre Ninney,the unexpected blockbuster of the year.
Claude -Autant Lara 's effort was made at a time as a potboiler so that he was able to finance the works he was anxious to make ;the follow -up to his "Monte Cristo" was a taboo subject,the case of the conscientious objector ("tu ne tueras point" 1963)and he spent every last penny for a movie which scared everybody and of course was not a box office hit
So it's obvious that "le comte de Monte Cristo " is a commissioned film ;but it does not mean that it's a bad movie :it shows respect for the audience ;like Vernay's previous versions , it was divided in two "époques" (eras) , and the audience had to come back to the theater to see the whole (a three-hour French production was not profitable ;so the audience had to pay twice; the 2024 version was released as a whole of course and it's about as long as the 1961 effort)
Louis Jourdan was of course too old to portray a 22-year-old sailor ,but as the story spreads over twenty years , it's not a big problem ;Jourdan ,like Jean Marais in the fifties ,had the aristocratic look and a dash of mystery that work quite well in the second part ;the best scenes in the first part are those with Abbé Faria whose philosophy will be more important than the famous treasure ;the second part was simplified ,and sweetened as far as Mercédès's fate is concerned ;her husband's is much different from the novel ,and the part of Haydée is reduced to the minimum .
Although impersonal,for a man who was one the greatest directors France has ever had ("douce" "le diable au corps" "la traversée de Paris" )the movie was made with care and is never dull ;it's certainly enjoyable, even for today's audience.
Au pays des cigales (1946)
Nothing new under the sun.
Henri is in Marseille, and is a song publisher. He is kindly in love with Mariette, the daughter of a fairground worker whom a competitor persecutes and wants to ruin in order to obtain the young girl's hand. After a few adventures, Henri finally exposes the villain .
It's a musical,for the star,Henri Alibert ,was a singer and the music was written by Vincent Scotto,par excellence the composer of the operetta taking place in the country of cicadas (check the title),that is to say the Provence and the French Riviera .
The screenplay is extremely poor, and has absolutely nothing in store for the viewer;so if you do not like this music style, pass it up.
High Wall (1947)
Past imperfect.
Released at a time when "psychiatric " movies were the craze "high wall" (very adequate title) does the trick quite well ; one often thinks of "spellbound", with his shrink-and-patient pair, Robert Taylor and Audrey Totter recalling Ingrid Bergman trying to break the walls which imprisoned Gregory Peck's memory.
Of course the treatments are obsolete,but with the second induced flashback,the story comes full circle ; the old man sufferingfrom arthrosis is a good supporting character and both the scenes of the aquarium and that when he's delivered forever from his pain are solid film noir. The depiction of the insane asylum is out of time ,but not without a touch of irony (they have good music in here).
Torna! (1954)
Mama don't goooo ! daddy come home!
This is melodrama,the whole melodrama ,nothing but melodrama starring the king ,Amedeo Nazzari and the queen,Yvonne Sanson ,of the genre ;to compare the Italian melo to Douglas Sirk is absurd :his is the ironical ending ,the false happy end and women are not poor victims of fate (in "imitation of life" the heroine favors her career over her love affair; in "written on the wind,"she reigns over the black oil kingdom; in "all that heaven allows" , she turns back from a hypocrit society and selfish offsprings)
Here the mom suffers suffers suffers , falling into the hand of a former cynical suitor (the role of the villain was tailor made for Franco fabrizzi), who trashes her, and she's not able to react to events she endures the most terrible humiliations. All she has to do is cry.
But what fate lies in store for daddy is not better: himself an illegimate child (in the first scenes, his cousin's false friendship speaks volumes about that) , the jealous relative makes him believe he did not father her adorable little girl .And in the end ,all he has to do is cry too....
It's melodrama through and through , if you like it ,like me, you'll enjoy .If not,pass it up.
Mam'zelle Spahi (1934)
Night moves
The colonel of the 32nd Spahis has a friend whom he has installed in a nearby hotel. He tells his wife that maneuvers take place every night in order to free himself.
Lieutenant Gilbert, for his part, tries to break off a cumbersome affair. And everyone ends up at the hotel.
But soon the secret will slowly begin to become known.
Also known as "night maneuvers ",which makes sense ,for when they receive fiery messages from their lovers , the colonel and his lieutenant tell their wife and fiancée that the duty calls ...
To take their revenge on their lovers who treat them like "prostitutes for soldiers" ,both women dress up as spahis (some kind of legionnaires), justifying the title ,"miss spahi" ;two orderlies do the same and become "the prefet's cousins ;but it's a far cry from "fanfare d'amour",released the same year,the German remake of witch spawned "some like it hot".
Conflict (1945)
Did she rise from the dead?
More a suspenseful Hitchcockian story than a film noir, it is an excellent thriller ;Bogart's sly look when he warns his missus , recommands her to drive carefully for the.mountain roads are dangerous; his very smart alibi and his appearance from nowhere before his stupefied wife will make your blood run cold
The perhaps botched job ,the dead who might or might not be dead and who sends things and calls on the phone,the empty apartment, all this anticipates the French classic "les.diaboliques " (1955) ; and it was made ten years before !The hero thinks he's losing his mind, just like the heroine in Clouzot's famous work .The fact that he's in love with his victim's sister (and thus jealous of her suitor) adds to the tension ;outside the USA, this jewel(with an extremely scary finale) should be more known.
The Locket (1946)
Diamonds are not always a girl's best friend.
Excellent psychiatric thriller in the vein of " spellbound" "cat people " or "secret beyond of the door" in the forties; it boasts a masterful construction :no less than four successive flashbacks ,the last one ,the best ,explaining the heroine's behavior ; it is mainly when you are a child. That you feel deep in your heart unfairness,humiliation and it follows you all life long : the harsh face of the wealthy woman will never leave the little girl's mind who still remembers it when she's walking down the aisle.
The picture of eyeless Cassandra gives an eerie side to the movie (like Salvador Dali 's dream in "spellbound" ) and Robert Mitchum's final scene is impressive .
Le guêpier (1976)
Le guêpier =sticky situation.
Renaud, who divides his time between gambling halls and racetracks, discovers that someone is paying off his debts. In exchange, he is asked for a favor: to steal a briefcase full of currency on the Paris/Lausanne express. Hesitant at first, he ends up accepting. On the train, Renaud meets ravishing Melba, a cabaret artist who does her Marlene Dietrich act .
Former actor Roger Pigaut's last theatrically-released work, it's sadly his less successful ;as an actor ,he starred in great movies ("douce" "sortilèges" "les frères bouquinquant ") ;his debut as a director began with a film aimed at the children's market "cerf-volant du bout du monde" ",one of the best movies ever released in this field ;his other efforts are moderately good
. Thrillers "comptes à rebours" and "trois milliards sans ascenseur "
.
"Le guêpier " is more tongue in chick , more a comedy than a thriller ;it takes time to take off ,and it does (moderately ) when both principals meet ; all in all , it's the actors who carry the film on their shoulders : Claude Brasseur as a rather grumpy misogynous amateur thief and charming (and rather limpet-like ) Swiss Marthe Keller ;both enliven a bit this trite and muddled script.
Master of the World (1961)
Madman across the atmosphere
Based on two Verne's books , the screenplay was written by Richard Matheson which guarantees a certain quality ; the message is intact ,it was also VIctor Hugo's : destroy the weapons and demob the armies ,and presto !no more wars. But Matheson does not pass over in silence the latent danger : the tyranny of a man whose megalomany knows no bounds .
Even among the so-called heroes ,it's not black and white ;Mr Prudent is a "master of war " and Philippe is a coward,whose attitude is obnoxious in the escape scenes (and he is not blamed for that);on the other hand , Strock (Bronson) appears first as an informer before revealing his true colors .
Of course the special effects will seem quaint and cheap for the 2024 audience, but this film retains the freshness of the those adventures cum sci -fi films of long ago. And Vincent Price is ideally cast as Robur ,one of these outlandish characters of Verne's books, the likes of capitaine Nemo .
Le cavalier noir (1945)
Tongue in chick Robin Hood cum Dick Turpin
Gilles Grangier's most salutary quality was his flair for films noirs , the 1955-1959 era plus "danger de mort" (1947)
"Le cavalier noir" (called "the black count" ,not "the black horseman" in the story ) is tongue in chick Robin Hood cum Dick Turpin adventures ;besides as the hero , Georges Guétary, is primarily a singer , it's also a musical and his songs,if your taste don't run that way, get in the way .
Guétary and co-star Nicole Maurey are bland and devoid of panache and charisma ;thus the best moments come from the old guard ,Jean Tissier and Alerme: the first is an officer in charge of fighting the smugglers :at the time ,there was in France a salt tax ,the "Gabelle" ; and he's so dumb one can wonder why his master,the marquis, never fired him ; the noble is not very smart either ;the first sequences are really funny : the officer takes the enemy (the black count) to the marquis' s desirable castle where both men reveal their plans to the outlaw ; the old local country squire tells about his numerous trysts in Versailles of yore .He and his henchman make a riotously funny pair, but the film quickly loses steam .
Rue des Saussaies (1951)
cops and robbers mix-up
Inspector Leblanc was chosen by Jeanne to avenge her brother who was murdered by Brasier, who, despite his honest appearance, is involved in criminal activity. But the real leader of the gang is Cortedani, whom no one can meet. Leblanc, following the chain, discovers Cortedani, then spends an unpleasant time.
The story may seem rather simple ,but it is actually terribly muddled and it is often hard to tell apart the cops and the robbers ;it was Ralph Habib's first effort ,and the following movies did not improve on it;his directing is flat and does nothing to enliven the paucity of the screenplay;female star Anne Vernon would see better days (Jacques Becker's works ,"les parapluies de Cherbourg").
This 'rue des Saussaies " became notorious duting the Occupation:it was the gestapo headquarters.
The Prodigal (1955)
A rich boy took his father's bread and started down the road
This extravaganza will remind you of your Sunday school of yore ,although only the beginning and the ending of the movie are inspired by Christ's parable ,and the prologue has something of the good Samaritan .
While Father is fattening up the calf , sonny is dallying with Samarra , the high priestess of Baal and Astarte , the nasty Gods who demands such horrors as human sacrifices ; but Jehovah is petulant and is not prepared to accept such lies (and unfair competition) .Lana Turner plays the temptress , a puppet in the hands of wicked priests who starve the poor people (although one has never the feeling they are starving). Edmund Purdom was one of the regular performers of these peplums (see also "the Egyptian ", which is much better ,for it is based on an absorbing book).