Bonne chance (1935)
Directed by Sacha Guitry, Fernand Rivers

Film Review

Sacha Guitry's second sound film, Bonne Chance, makes a stark contrast to his first, Pasteur (a sober biography of the life of Louis Pasteur), and is far more typical of his subsequent films.  This is a playful and sometimes irresistibly funny romantic comedy, very much in the style of Ernst Lubitsch's early American films. The only things preventing it from being a French cinema classic are the lacklustre direction and some excruciating longueurs (one of which involves Guitry performing some rather pointless and seemingly interminable longhand calculations in what looks like an Open University outtake).   Guitry stars in the film along side his real-life wife, Jacqueline Delubac, who would feature in many of his later films.

Bonne Chance was released simultaneously with Pasteur, with the result that it was largely overshadowed by the latter film, which received far greater exposure and critical acclaim.  The film was remade by RKO in 1940 as Lucky Partners, directed by Lewis Milestone, an inferior work which lacks the charm and sparkling wit of the original.

Film Synopsis

Marie Muscat is a young and attractive laundress who lives with her mother in a modest Parisian apartment.  She is engaged to marry Prosper, a fairly dim young man who is away at the moment on his military training.  Marie was manoeuvred into the engagement by her mother, who has decided it is high time her daughter found herself a husband.  In fact, Marie is more strongly attracted to one of her neighbours, a forty-something artist named Claude who ekes out a modest existence by selling his uninspired daubings.  One day, Claude wishes Marie 'Good Luck' and, believing it to be a good omen, the young woman buys a lottery ticket.  She tells the artist that if she wins she will give half of the money to him.  Fate smiles on Marie and she wins the jackpot - two million francs! - but Claude has reservations about taking his share of the winnings.  Instead, he persuades Marie to accompany him on a long voyage.  They must return within two weeks, because this is when Marie's marriage to Prosper is due to take place.  The holiday gives Claude the chance to squander his earnings on Marie, and she in return brings him good fortune in the casino when they arrive in Monte Carlo.  Knowing that he cannot wed Marie, Claude considers adopting her - and then he has another stroke of good fortune.  Prosper has found himself another woman and Marie is free to marry who she chooses!