Mirages (1937)
Directed by Alexandre Ryder

Film Review

Apart from its glib insights into the Folies-Bergères circa 1930 and a few half-decent musical numbers, there isn't much to commend this tediously lacklustre and hopelessly unfocused melodrama.  Polish-born director Alexandre Ryder deserves his place in obscurity if Mirages (a.k.a. Si tu m'aimes) is anything to go by.  How could a film that boasts the combined talents of no fewer than three acting legends - Arletty, Michel Simon and Jean-Louis Barrault - fail so spectacularly to take off?  Ryder's totally uninspired direction, combined with a sloppily cobbled together script that is unbelievably pedestrian, make this one of the dullest films of the decade, and without the musical numbers to liven it up it would have been totally unbearable.  Arletty and Simon would be far better served by their combined appearances in Circonstances atténuantes (1939) and Fric-Frac (1939), whilst Barrault and Arletty would secure a prominent place in film history via their unforgettable pairing in Marcel Carné's Les Enfants du paradis (1945).

Film Synopsis

With the help of her friends, Jeanne succeeds in getting herself into Paris's top night spot, the Folies-Bergères, and within no time she is a star of the music hall.  Meanwhile, her fiancé Pierre has left to work in Algeria, expecting that Jeanne will one day join him.  In the end, Jeanne cannot give up her life of stardom and abandons Pierre for the sake of her career.