Le Bateau d’Émile (1962)

Le Bateau d’Émile is a French film comedy-drama first released in 1962, directed by Denys de La Patellière.  The film is based on a novel by Georges Simenon and stars Annie Girardot, Lino Ventura, Michel Simon, Pierre Brasseur and Jacques Monod.  It has also been released under the title: Le Homard flambé.  Our overall rating for this film is: good.


Realising he is close to death, Charles-Edmond Larmentiel returns to his home town of La Rochelle to enact a cruel vengeance on his family.  Forty years ago, his father, the owner of a prosperous fishing company, drove him away from the town after he managed to get one of the working girls pregnant.  To the horror of his younger brother François, Charles-Edmond reveals that he intends to bequeath his entire estate to his illegitimate son, Émile Bouet, a mere fisherman.  Afraid that he may be ruined, François befriends Émile and offers him a senior job in his company.  Émile can hardly believe his good fortune, but realises his prospects may be jeopardised by his temperamental girlfriend Fernande...

One well-known fact about Lino Ventura is that, before he became an actor, he was a professional wrestler.  Among his many sparring partners he could hardly have had one who was quite so tough and indomitable as Annie Girardot.  The pair make a sublime warring couple in this adaptation of a Georges Simenon novel.  No falls, no submissions - just plain honest-to-goodness entertainment.  In addition to the memorable Ventura-Girardot double act, there’s Michel Simon’s poisonous old man routine, and Pierre Brasseur as possibly the smoothest villain you’ll ever see in any French film.

Generally, the film is much lighter in tone than Simenon’s novel,  and even slips into farce in a few sequences.  It’s worth watching the film just for the scene where Ventura gallantly picks up Girardot only to drop her into a puddle.  Denys de La Patellière’s overly restrained direction prevents the film from being as dark or as interesting as the story warrants, but amidst the comedy there are some dark undercurrents which do suggest conflict – between the sexes, and between the working classes and their paymasters.   Le Bateau d’Émile is not a particularly great film, but it has a lot of charm and a very attractive collection of principal players.

© James Travers 2007



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