Coeur de lilas (1932) - film review

When the owner of a factory is found dead, one of his employees is charged with his murder.  Detective André Lucot is not convinced of the accused man’s guilt and is persuaded that the real culprit is an attractive 25 year old woman named Lilas.  He gains the confidence of the reticent young woman, who is living amongst hardened criminals and prostitutes in a slum inn.  As their friendship turns to love, Lucot becomes convinced that Lilas is innocent.  Then Lilas reveals her devastating secret...

Coeur de lilas is an impressive early example of the French policier and was based on a stage-play by Bernard and Hirsch.  It is one of the earliest films to be directed by the Russian émigré Anatole Litvak who later went on to make a successful career as a film director in the United States.  The film cost 120,000 dollars, making it reputedly the most expensive film to be made in France up to this point.  The plot is admittedly somewhat unsophisticated, but it has all the familiar film noir elements which would recur in subsequent French crime thrillers over the following decades.   The film was a popular commercial success, more than recouping its high production cost.

Perhaps the most striking thing about this film is how it captures the mood and feel of the early 1930s, thanks to some ambitious exterior filming, convincing interior sets and – most noticeably – the popular musical hall melodies which run the length of the film.  The film exudes a sense of nostalgia which makes watching it today a genuine treat, in spite of the dated production values and the mediocre quality of the surviving film prints.

The film features a haunting performance from Marcelle Romée, a young actress who is all but forgotten today.  She plays the vulnerable heroine Lilas, opposite lead actor André Luguet.   Romée’s promising film career was cut short when she committed suicide a year after making this film, adding a tragic note to the film’s poignant conclusion.  Legendary actor Jean Gabin also stars in the film.  Some years before he became immortalised as the popular tragic hero in films such as Pépé-le-Moko and La Belle équipe, Gabin appears here in an a somewhat atypical role – a rather brutish roughneck always looking for a fight.

Many early French sound films included musical hall-style songs, presumably to make the new medium appeal to the wider public.  Coeur de lilas is no exception and includes no less than three numbers.  The first is sung by Fréhel, a popular singer of the 1930s, renowned for her rough yet deeply emotional voice.  Fréhel and Gabin sing the film’s main song, La Môme caoutchouc (which Gabin subsequently recorded solo, with great success).   The final number is sung by a comparatively unknown actor named Fernandel...

© James Travers 2002

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