Le Tournoi dans la cité (1929) - film review

Drama / History

Summary

France, 1562. Catherine de Medici rules as regent for her son, the 12 year-old Charles IX. Though nominally Catholic, Catherine seeks to maintain peace between the rival Catholic and Protestant factions. To that end, she outlaws duelling and invites the Protestant ’Queen’, the Comtesse de Baynes, to sit beside her at the forthcoming Tournament and her son, François, to attend at court. Isabelle Ginori, lady-in-waiting to the Queen, loves Henri de Rogier, a Catholic nobleman. The pair, accompanied by the Comte Ginori, Isabelle’s brother, go to church to announce their engagement. They are observed by François who, in the Comte’s hearing, boasts that Isabelle shall come to him that night. Outraged, the Comte challenges François to a duel. To avoid the guard, they fight on the city wall. Lucrèce Pazzi, François’s mistress, learns of the duel and arrives at the scene just as the Comte falls dead from the battlements. François presents himself at court and is urged by the Queen to aid her in her efforts at reconciliation between the two religious factions. As a reward for his assistance, François requests Isabelle’s hand in marriage. The Queen agrees and an engagement feast is arranged for that evening. Henri is restrained from intervening at court but bursts in on the feast. He and François fight. Henri is wounded but the intervention of the Queen’s equerry ends the encounter prematurely. The pair are taken before the Queen. François proposes that they should settle the matter at the Tournament, the winner taking Isabelle’s hand. Henri and François joust before the crowds at the Tournament. François has the upper hand when the guard arrives to announce the discovery of the Comte’s body and, on the strength of the jealous Lucrèce’s information, names François as his killer. Refusing to be taken alive, François is overpowered by the guard and dies in his mother’s arms. Henri and Isabelle embrace.
© Mike Green (Chipstead, Surrey, England)

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