Film Review
L'Homme au chapeau rond
brought to an end one of the most illustrious film careers in French
cinema, that of the esteemed actor of stage and screen Jules Auguste
Muraire, better known as Raimu. A few weeks after the film was
released, Raimu died in hospital from a heart attack in the course of a
routine operation on his leg. Three years previously, Raimu has
been admitted to the Comédie-Française, bringing a
temporary suspension to his screen career as he returned to his first
love, the stage, with limited success. In 1946, Raimu returned to
the screen with two films -
Les
Gueux au paradis and
L'Homme
au chapeau rond - which could have signalled a revival in his
flagging career. In fact, they proved to be his swansong.
L'Homme au chapeau rond is by
far Raimu's darkest film, a relentlessly gloomy adaptation of Fyodor
Dostoyevsky's comparatively little-known novel
The Eternal Husband. The film
was directed, with style, by Pierre Billon, a filmmaker with a natural
affinity with the darker side of human experience, evidenced by his
deeply pessimistic noir-like thriller
Jusqu'au dernier (1957).
Billon's penchant for doom-laden atmosphere and expressionistic design
comes to the fore in the film's deeply disturbing opening and closing
sequences, with Raimu's instantly recognisable silhouette used to
chilling effect to set the scene for what is unquestionably one of
French cinema's bleakest studies in hatred.
In the course of his career, Raimu played many villains, many
characters disfigured by self-loathing or contempt of others.
Here, he inhabits one of his most despicable creations, a man totally
and utterly consumed by bitterness, to the extent that he inflicts
cruel psychological torture on his little girl and drives her to an
early grave. Not many fathers resort to threatening to hang
themselves in order to get their wayward children to stay in and eat
their supper. Raimu's portrayal of an alcoholic father who has
allowed hatred for others to completely efface his humanity is
harrowing to behold, and yet the actor compels us to keep watching and
cling to some vestige of sympathy for him as his character sinks deeper
and deeper into the mire of depravity. The fragile humanity that
Aimé Clariond brings to his portrayal of the protagonist's rival
and victim merely accentuates the monstrosity of Raimu's character, who
ultimately becomes more terrifying than anything in any horror
film. What
L'Homme au chapeau
rond offers is a stark vision of human nature at its ugliest -
one of the grimmest films you are ever likely to see.
© James Travers 2013
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Shortly after the death of his wife, Nicolas is shocked to discover
that he is not the biological father of their infant daughter,
Liza. It appears that the real father is an old acquaintance of
his, a man named Michel. In an attempt to coax a confession from
Michel that he had an affair with his wife, Nicolas begins stalking
him. As Michel begins to realise the truth he is appalled that
his daughter should be in the hands of such a vile person as Nicolas
and hastily arranges for her to be placed with a foster family.
When Nicolas refuses to visit her, Liza falls ill and dies. A
short while later, Nicolas seeks Michel's help in securing the hand in
marriage of a 17-year-old girl. Aware that Nicolas would make the
worst of husbands, Michel does his best to thwart the marriage.
One evening, Nicolas visits Michel in his lodgings, intent on
murder...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.