L’Homme mystérieux (1933) - film review

To resolve a business matter, Pierre needs to have his brother Raymond released from the psychiatric institution to which he was committed after he attacked his wife Louise.  The latter is still convinced that Raymond intends to kill her but agrees, reluctantly, to press for her husband’s release.  Against the advice of his doctor, Raymond is allowed to return home to his wife and young son, apparently restored to his erstwhile normality.  Unfortunately, Raymond is anything but well, and his wife’s fears are about to be confirmed...

Any film enthusiast watching this little known short film from French director Maurice Tourneur today would have little hesitation in describing it as a fair example of classic film noir.  The fact that it was made almost a decade before the first bona fide American film noir is interesting, since it demonstrates pretty convincingly that the film noir style had its origins in European cinema of the 1930s and was not an invention of Hollywood as some would claim.  Tourneur would follow this with a gangster thriller which is even more recognisable as an almost full-blooded film noir, Justin de Marseille (1935).

© James Travers 2008

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