Une vie (1958) - film review

In the late 19th century, Jeanne Dandieu lives with her parents in an isolated country house in Normandy.  Her only companion is her childhood friend, Gilberte, who is now her servant.  One fateful day, Jeanne drifts out to sea in a rowing boat.  Soon after she is rescued by fisherman, she meets a young man, Julien, with whom she falls instantly in love.  They marry, but it soon becomes apparent that Julien has no love for Jeanne.  He insists on having a separate room where, unbeknown to Jeanne, he takes Gilberte as his mistress…

Maria Schell stars in this respectable adaptation of a great Guy de Maupassant novel.  As in René Clément’s Gervaise (1956), she plays a young woman who is unlucky in love and driven by cruel fate to endure a life of pain and tragedy.  The bleak Normandy setting, beautifully shot by Claude Renoir, conveys the barren futility of Jeanne’s hopeless love but also gives the film a cold feel that plays against its emotional potency.   The characterless, slightly wooden performances from Christian Marquand and the supporting cast further weaken the film’s dramatic impact, almost to the point that Maria Schell resembles a star actress single-handedly trying to lift a faltering amateur stage production.  For all its faults, Une vie is an alluring, well-crafted film with a strange appeal, suffused with a bleak Brontë-style poetry and surprisingly brutal in its depiction of an unrequited love.

© James Travers 2007

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