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French films Romance
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Fabiola is among the earliest and best of the big budget Roman spectacle film which became popular both in Hollywood and European cinema in the late 1950s, and which has enjoyed a recent revival in the shape of the American blockbuster Gladiator. Whilst it lacks the gloss and extravagance of such films as Ben-Hur, Fabiola fares much better in other areas...
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After the commercial failure of Les Portes de la nuit (1949) and the abandonment of Fleur de l’Age, director Marcel Carné soon made a return to form with this suspenseful adaptation of a Georges Simenon novel. The film marks another promising comeback – that of Jean Gabin after service in World War II and an unsuccessful attempt to break into American cinema...
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In this film, which can best be described as visual poetry, Jean Cocteau retells the familiar tale of Orpheus and Eurydice, but in a original and fascinating way. Death is represented by an alluring princess in a tight-fitting black dress, chauffered in a Rolls Royce limousine and served by leather-clad motorcyclists. The afterlife is a vista of decaying buildings beneath a pall of starless...
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Rendez-vous de juillet is in many ways one of the most remarkable and unexpected French films of the 1940s. It certainly represents a clear break from the traditional style of film which that decade excelled in. With its exuberant depiction of youth culture and realistic portrayal of young people rollicking in the happy interval between education and full time employment...
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Juliette ou La clef des songes is probably Marcel Carné’s most underrated and misunderstood film, but it deserves to be rated as one of his most inspired and poetic. The film was conceived in 1940, but could not be made at the time because of fears over Nazi censorship. After the success of La Marie du port in 1949...
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René Clair’s telling of the Faustian myth is a characteristically tongue in cheek rendition of the famous tale, reminiscent in style to his earlier American film, I Married a Witch (1942). Both films rely heavily on special effects and unusual photography to emphasise the supernatural elements of the plot, but in a way that is intentionally comical...
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Andalousie is a film version of one of a number of popular operettas starring the Spanish popular music idol of the late 1940s, Luis Mariano. Although the film now looks somewhat dated and unsophisticated, it was hugely successful in its day, and its blend of comedy, romantic drama and music is not unappealing. Extensive location filming...
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Arguably Jacques Becker’s best and most famous film, Casque d’Or illustrates perhaps more than any of his films his unique conception of film-making. Becquer’s main preoccupation is to capture through the medium of film the essence of human life – the pleasures, the torments, the triumphs, the defeats...
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This early film from Henri Verneuil is one of many fruitful collaborations involving the director and the great French comic actor Fernandel. The film, in many ways a conventional early 1950s melodrama, sees Fernandel playing one of his rare straight roles, on this occasion opposite the up-and-coming starlet Françoise Arnoul...
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Although unmistakably a classic of French cinema, Le plaisir is marginally less satisfying than Ophül’s other attempts at films tableaux (La Ronde and Madame de…) – probably because the theme linking the three segments of the film is somewhat insubstantial. ‘Self-delusion’ would appear to be a better and more accurate linking theme than ‘pleasure’...
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Already renowned for his acutely surreal and optimistic view of life, director René Clair surpassed himself with this outlandish romantic fantasy. As French matinee idol Gérard Philipe is propelled through history and cardboard Freudian dreamscapes, into the arms of such beauties as Martine Carol and Gina Lollobrigida...
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Le Carrosse d’Or is the film which marked the return of Jean Renoir to European film-making after his 13 year stay in the United States. It is a lavish production, beautifully filmed in colour, with music provided by Vivaldi. The film was made in English and filmed in Rome, and three versions of the film were released (in English...
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Les Orgueilleux was an ambitious attempt to break with the conventional romantic drama which dominated French cinema in the early 1950s. Filmed mainly on location in Mexico and with some graphic depictions of human suffering, it has an hard-edged authenticity which the Paris-bound studio dramas of the period lacked. Some of the images in the film still retain their power to shock...
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Thérèse Raquin is one of the few films made by Marcel Carné after World War II which has the stature of his earlier triumphs. With its tale of doomed love in an atmosphere-laden setting, the film is unmistakably Carné. As in many of his films, the protagonists are victims in a cruel game of fate...
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Whilst not in the league of Marcel Carné’s pre-WWII classics, L’Air de Paris is a pleasing example of the director’s art, a light melodrama on the folly of young love set in that eternal city of romance, Paris. Carné’s humanity and keen understanding of human nature is evident throughout and whilst the story is admittedly the stuff of fairy tales or trite...
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French cancan marks director Jean Renoir’s spectacular return to French cinema, after a 15 year long absence, working mainly in the United States. Comparing this film with his earlier works, the difference in cinematographic style is striking, and the Hollywood imprint is noticeably present. Because of this, the film has a greater visual impact...
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This 1954 film from director Claude Autant-Lara is probably the most well-known and finest adaptation of Stendhal’s complex literary masterpiece, Le Rouge et le noir. Beautifully filmed in Eastmancolor, with captivating acting performances and a script that vividly evokes Stendhal’s celebrated novel, the film exemplifies the French quality period drama for this decade...
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Le Port du désir is a film which was clearly influenced by contemporary American film noir and has much in common with another worthy example of French film noir, Du rififi chez les hommes (directed by Jules Dassin), which was released the same year. What is striking about both of these two films, and what sets them apart from the vast majority of noir-influenced French crime-thrillers...
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This lesser known Fernandel comedy features the great French comic hero in one of his most poignant roles. The fragility of the May to September love affair is beautifully characterised, with enchanting performances from Fernandel and Nicole Berger, although it is perhaps Claude Nollier’s portrayal of the sharp-tongued and manipulative sister-in-law who steals the show....
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This is a fine tragicomic romantic film from arguably the most romantic of all the great pre-WW2 French film directors, René Clair. It has the distinction of being Clair’s first film to be made in colour, and it unites two great acting legends of French cinema – Michèle Morgan and Brigitte Bardot...
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