L’Armoire volante (1948) - film review

Alfred Pic is a conscientious tax inspector who lives with his authoritarian aged aunt.  When, one wintry morning, the redoubtable Madame Lobligeois sets off to collect some furniture from a house in Clermont-Ferrand, her nephew is convinced he will never see her again.  He is proven right.  On the way back, his aunt dies suddenly, and the removal men put her body into her wardrobe.   Just as the removal men are explaining all this to Alfred, their lorry is stolen, along with its load, which includes the dead Madame Lobligeois.  When a notary explains to him that his aunt cannot be declared dead until he produces her body, Alfred begins a desperate attempt to recover the stolen wardrobe...

Fernandel may be one of the best-loved figures in French cinema but even his most ardent admirers have to admit that the majority of his films are mediocre, shallow vehicles to showcase their star performer, of limited appeal to general film enthusiasts.  A few of Fernandel’s films, however, stand out and are not only superlative examples of French cinema, but also show the horse-faced comic actor at his best.  L’Armoire volante is one such film – an inspired black comedy which is almost the perfect antithesis of a typical Fernandel offering.

The film was directed by Carlo Rim, an established screenwriter who had only made one previous film, Simplet (1942), which he co-directed with Fernandel.  Somehow, Rim managed to persuade his star that the film would only work if he played his character dead straight – and he was right.  It is Fernandel’s restrained performance which makes L’Armoire volante so engaging and so irresistibly funny.  The situation Fernandel’s character finds himself in is enough to make us laugh, and it is a treat to see the actor playing against the comedy instead of (as is more usually the case) over-hyping it for all it is worth.  

L’Armoire volante isn’t just one of Fernandel’s best films, it is also one of only a handful of his films that can legitimately be described a film d’auteur.  Nicolas Hayer’s creepily atmospheric photography and Georges Van Parys’s eerie music both brilliantly underscore the macabre and humorous elements of the plot.  Add to that some wonderful surreal touches and the result is unlike anything that Fernandel had ever appeared in up until this time.  Unfortunately, black comedy was not something that French cinema audiences of the period appreciated and the film was not a great success.  Since then, however, the film’s appeal has grown and it has aged far better than most of Fernandel’s films.  It may not be quite in the same league as that other classic black comedy which involves a corpse in a piece of furniture, Arsenic and Old Lace (1944), but it comes pretty close.

© James Travers 2009

Write a review for this film...

What do you think of this film?