Film Review
Whilst
Quai de Grenelle does
somewhat resemble an all-too-obvious attempt to cash in on the
popularity of American film noir in France of the late 1940s, it is
actually a surprisingly good example of its genre and succeeds where
Marcel Carné and Jacques Prévert failed, which is to
extend the life of poetic realism beyond its doom-laden heyday of the
late 1930s into the era of post-WWII modernity.
The plot may be excessively contrived, the pace a little uneven, the secondary
characters somewhat prone to caricature, but for all that it is a
compelling piece that deals astutely and compassionately with two of
the most pressing social preoccupations of its time - juvenile
delinquency and class prejudice. As these continue to be major
problems for western society, the film still has a chilling resonance,
something that sets it apart from the vast majority of French thrillers
of the pre-Nouvelle Vague era.
The film is adapted from the novel
La Mort à boire by Jacques Laurent
(better known under his other name Cecil Saint-Laurent, of
Caroline chérie fame) and
directed, with considerable flair, by Emil E. Reinert, a
French filmmaker and screenwriter of German origin, whose diverse
output included films made in France, Austria, Italy, the UK and the
United States. Reinert pays an affectionate homage to classic
film noir by using extremely low camera angles (perhaps a little too
gratuitously), shadowy interiors (which suggest the moral ambiguity of
their inhabitants) and some eerily beautiful night-time sequences set
in Paris that might well have been filmed by Otto Preminger.
The story, that of an innocent young man's dramatic and irreversible descent
into hell, is pure film noir material, and for a film that starts out
fairly low key, almost as a slight comedy, it is surprising how utterly
bleak it becomes in its last thirty minutes. Plotwise, it may be
a pretty conventional crime drama, but by the time the 'Fin' caption flashes up
Quai de Grenelle impresses as
one of the most shocking French films of its era.
One of the reasons why the film is so effective is because it is
impeccably well cast, with Henri Vidal suitably chosen to play the
doomed hero, whose fate is conveniently spelled out for him in his
surname, Cavalade (en cavale being the French phrase for 'on the
run'). (The fact that his character is young and poor also plays
a part in his downfall). It is role for which Vidal was naturally
cast both on screen and in real life (the actor died from a heart
attack in 1959, aged 40, after succumbing to drugs). He may not
have had a great dramatic range but his charisma and instantly likeable
persona, together with an incongruous air of fragility, made him a
bankable lead in films such as this.
Of course it helps that Vidal is surrounded by a host of eye-catching
females that include Françoise Arnoul (stunning at the start of
her career), Maria Mauban (looking scarily like Barbara Stanwyck in
some scenes) and Micheline Francey. Today, Mauban is remembered
for taking over the part of Louis de Funès's long suffering wife
Josépha in
Le Gendarme et les Extra-terrestres
(1979), so it's fitting that de Funès should also appear in the
film, in a short but typically humorous scene. Two other French
acting legends - Jean Tissier and Robert Dalban - complete an admirable
ensemble, with Tissier giving the film's stand out performance as a
shadowy shoe collector who comes to a very, very nasty end. Don't
be taken in by
Quai de Grenelle's
deceptively mundane beginning. This grimly fatalistic drama still
has the power to shock and grips with the force of a fully grown boa
constrictor in its starkly nihilistic final reel.
© James Travers 2014
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Jean-Louis Cavalade is an impetuous young man who likes nothing better
than to hunt snakes in the Forest of Fontainebleau. One day,
whilst out walking the streets of Paris with his girlfriend Simone, he
gets into a heated argument with a belligerent traffic cop.
Before he knows it, Jean-Louis is mistaken for a hoodlum who recently
committed a hold-up, and is soon being pursued by both the police and a
sensation-hungry journalist. Mado, a kind-hearted prostitute,
offers him sanctuary, but Jean-Louis repays her by striking her dead in
the course of a row. After committing a second murder, it seems
that the young man's fate is sealed, unless he can escape from France
before the police catch up with him...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.