Tag: Marcel Dalio

On the Riviera (1951, Walter Lang)

On the Riviera ends abruptly. The film promises an amping-up of its mistaken identity, only to immediately chuck it and do another musical number. It’s a solid musical number, but the film was on the rise with the comedy. It was about to get really good. The ending features a double scene for star Danny Kaye—he plays two parts, an entertainer and a maverick pilot—there ought to be some pay-off. Instead, it’s just over. And not ambitiously over; director Lang and Kaye have been giving Riviera a lot; I was expecting some kind of set piece meeting for the two Kayes.

Nope.

Thank the Hayes Code.

At least the final number’s good. Most of Kaye’s numbers in the film are good, though the “Popo the Puppet” number (which went on to be one of Kaye’s career hits, written by his wife, Sylvia Fine) is very strange. Riviera is about stage performer Kaye trying to make it… on the Riviera. He’s American, he does impressions, he sings and dances, but boss Sig Roman just plain doesn’t like his act. Kaye works with girlfriend Corinne Calvet (though I don’t think she’s ever actually in one of the routines). Kaye’s career plot is about this act he creates during the film, and it causes a sensation, which leads to television work.

Because the movie’s about making it on TV.

In France. But Hollywood France, where everyone speaks English.

Lang directs the handful of TV sequences a little too well. They’re framed for TV (there’s TV boxing even), and the numbers are reasonably budgeted and TV-appropriate, but they’re just a little too competent. They’re a little too professional. It’s great for some of the other numbers, but “Popo” is Kaye as a life-size puppet being flung around while he sings about being capable only if someone else controls him. While dressed in a powder blue Napoleon outfit.

It’s just weird. And it’s long. And it’s unclear why the French public watching the broadcast would want to see it.

But then, I wouldn’t have thought it’d go on to be a big hit.

The other songs—also written by Fine—are, well, fine. I mean, the title song’s a bit bland given the eventual plot, but the first act of Riviera is about showcasing all the location photography Fox had available for the Riviera. Once the actors show up—occasionally with some great rear projection composites—they’re in studio. Even for the exteriors, which sometimes leads to unfortunate backdrops.

The film’s first act, with Calvet and Kaye having money troubles—then more troubles with Ruman’s threat of firing—is slow. They watch the news about pilot Kaye successfully flying around the world, which entertainer Kaye turns into a show number. It’s an incredible number, and there’s no way Kaye should be having trouble getting gigs.

The number’s all about pilot Kaye being a hit with the ladies, all around the world, which pilot Kaye thinks is a hoot, though his wife, played by Gene Tierney, does not. Unfortunately, the success of the performance comes with bad news for pilot Kaye—investor Jean Murat is going to try to bankrupt Kaye, Marcel Dalio, and Henri Letondal for their IP instead of paying for it. Unbeknownst to pilot Kaye, Tierney invites Murat to a party. Unbeknownst to entertainer Kaye, pilot Kaye invites Calvet to the same party. Pilot Kaye’s extramarital pursuits are just part of the package; there’s no hiding, which would be difficult, say, if entertainer Kaye found himself impersonating pilot Kaye and didn’t know all the women throwing themselves at him.

Pilot Kaye has to secure other funding, thinking they can cancel the party; except when Dalio and Letondal find out Tierney has invited Murat, they have to pretend Kaye’s still in town. Enter entertainer Kaye, who’s ready to try his stage act in real-life, leading to an engaging, often very funny comedy of mistaken identity errors. Dalio and Letondal take over most of the second act and are great. Tierney’s playing the straight woman part, but she gets some material eventually. Kaye’s better as the French pilot than the American entertainer, which is good for the movie (and Tierney) but not great for Calvet. Calvet’s apparently just around because she’s actually French.

It’s a good comedy with an excellent pace. The third act crashes, but it’s not the movie’s fault. It’s a bummer because they were finally at a spot where Kaye would have to act opposite himself, with entertainer Kaye getting some character development. Potentially. Also, he and Tierney getting to do a comedy scene together. It’d have been nice for Tierney to have a hijinks scene.

Anyway, pretty good—oh, and gorgeous color photography from Leon Shamroy.

This post is part of the Danny Kaye Blogathon hosted by Erica of Poppity Talks Classic Film.

To Have and Have Not (1944, Howard Hawks)

Whatever To Have and Have Not’s original intent—not just novel versus film but film in pre-production to film completed—what it ends up doing and doing better than maybe anything else ever is star-make. To Have and Have Not showcases Lauren Bacall in constantly imaginative ways, including how much you can like her when she’s not being very nice. And how good she is at not being very nice while still seeming like she’s immaculate. So Bacall’s an unenthusiastic ex-pat in 1940 in Martinique; the French have already fallen, the island run by Nazi-allied Vichy. Except the locals are pro-France but quiet about it in general. The United States isn’t in the war yet so there are Americans around the island. Including lead Humphrey Bogart. Now, To Have and Have Not is a Humphrey Bogart movie. You’re supposed to entertain the possibility he’s actually flirting with Dolores Moran, which Bacall gives him crap about but everyone—Bacall included—can see every time Bogart’s got a scene with Moran, he’s just clamoring to get back into the banter with Bacall. When Bacall’s offscreen in Have Not, which is an actual action movie with Nazis trying to get the good guys—including an adorable, hilarious drunk Walter Brennan—so there are stakes here—but any time Bacall’s not around, it’s all about getting back to her. The movie’s already got a big problem with the end, who knows what it’d be like without Bacall enchanting the whole thing.

Bogart’s got a boat and takes rich guys out fishing. Not exciting but it keeps him fed and best friend Brennan sufficiently drunk. He’s apolitical until fate drops Bacall into his proverbial lap (and later in the literal) while also taking away his payday. Now in a spot, he decides to help out friend, bar-owner, Frenchman, resistor Marcel Dalio. Dalio’s got some friends of friends who want to bring another friend to the island so then they can break yet another friend out of Devil’s Island, the French prison island. As long as it pays, Bogart’s fine with it. Because he’s going to at least get Bacall out of there before the local Vichy police (Dan Seymour is the boss in an okay but not great performance) starts stamping down harder. War’s coming, after all.

Throw in actual good guy Walter Szurovy for some ideological clashes with Bogart’s right-minded but mercenary approach, Moran as Szurovy’s wife who no one believes Bogart’s interested in, drunk Brennan getting into trouble, Hoagy Carmichael as the piano man, Sheldon Leonard as one of the cops–To Have and Have Not has everything; actually it’s excessive. And it’s beautifully made. Hawks does a great job with the direction. Especially of the actors, but in general he and photographer Sidney Hickox do an excellent job making the handful of sets feel like a whole world, without ever being constrained. It helps the action follows Bogart out onto the water. The more complicated shots are all the action thriller stuff, the more complicated lighting is all the Bacall and Bogart stuff. Hickox, presumably under Hawks’s direction, brings the shadows for those scenes. Even when it’s a daytime shot, they find some blinds to shade Bacall. It’s like the movie’s doing lighting tests on her or trying to psyche her out and see how she responds under pressure. The sort of proto-noir expressionist lighting never makes a scene and occasionally gets old. See, the audience already has a read on Bacall because her performance hits the requisite beats as far as the narrative goes, but just because Bacall doesn’t have a line doesn’t mean she’s not the focus of the moment.

And the famous “you know how to whistle” scene is pretty early in the picture. And it’s as good as everyone says. All because Bacall. During the second act the way the narrative distance works—Bacall clearly excelling but the film not giving her increased attention for it—kind of promises there’s going to be something worth it in the end. Yes, Bacall does get the final moment (plus a punctation), but she doesn’t get the third act itself. It’s still that action thriller with Bogart, albeit a lovestruck one.

Good script from Jules Furthman and William Faulkner, despite the movie not having an ending; some of the dialogue is phenomenal—at one point Bogart just starts grinning through most of it, positively giddy regardless of the danger because Bacall. Unfortunately that giddiness isn’t enough to cover for the resolve being so blah. Still. Good script.

Pretty good editing from Christian Nyby, who occasionally cuts a little too late and a little too soon and there are costar reactions in shots. Bacall watching Bogart and Brennan do their thing, Bogart watching Bacall walk then remembering he’s supposed to be listening too. It ends up being charming, even if its loose.

To Have and Have Not is good action thriller with a singular performance from Bacall, a strong, nimble one from Bogart, and solid work from everyone else. Even if they don’t make the most of the role (obviously not Carmichael, who’s awesome as the piano man). Hawks’s direction is excellent, writing’s good, just don’t have an ending. It’s a good film.

And Bacall makes it a classic one.

This post is part of the Third Annual Lauren Bacall Blogathon hosted by Crystal of In The Good Old Days Of Classic Hollywood.

The Rules of the Game (1939, Jean Renoir)

There are two big sequences in Rules of the Game. There’s the hunting sequence, which concentrates on the rabbits and pheasants before–and as–they are killed for sport. The animals are hunted without motive or enjoyment. Until a line in the third act connects events, the hunt is mostly just a way to inform Nora Gregor of husband Marcel Dalio’s infidelity. The second sequence has Gaston Modot, as Dalio’s gamekeeper, hunting Julien Carette through Gregor and Dalio’s party.

Why is Modot hunting Carette? Well, Carette’s after Modot’s wife, of course. Gregor and Dalio’s own infidelities and extramarital romances also come to a head during the party, but with far less violence. And Modot is the only one who gets much attention from the society party guests (as he’s shooting up a country estate).

Director Renoir and co-writer Carl Koch offer these events without judgment, without encouraging judgment. They present these moral dalliances of society folk and their domestics as inexplicable, but entirely predictable. Renoir isn’t willing to condemn anyone–not Modot, who’s a bully to his wife (Paulette Dubost), nor Mila Parély (as Dalio’s mistress). It just wouldn’t be any fun if the viewer cared enough about the characters to dislike them.

The film amuses and mortifies, usually at the same time. The opening titles carry the subtitle “a dramatic fantasy,” which is about as serious as Renoir takes it. It can’t be funny if it’s serious. It’s not a cop out on Renoir’s part–the film has limited potential as a melodrama anyway–but it also doesn’t completely connect. By going for the absurd humor in every situation (until the end, anyway), Renoir keeps everything at a distance.

Lots of great performances, including Renoir himself in the film’s most likable part. Carette is likable too, but annoying. As an actor, Renoir is never annoying. Dubost is great. Dalio is great. Toutain is pretty good. Gregory is a little too tragic (she’s playing for the melodrama while everyone else is playing for the absurdism). Parély is good too, even if she eventually just gets to show off her ability to do hysterics.

Technically, the film’s marvelous. Renoir and his four cinematographers showcase the exteriors of the country estate, maintaining its place in nature while completely otherworldly as its populated by these absurd, tragically awful people. And Marthe Huguet and Marguerite Renoir’s editing is phenomenal.

It’s brilliantly made, brilliantly constructed, but never human. Its caricatures run–gloriously–wild.

3.5/4★★★½

CREDITS

Directed by Jean Renoir; written by Carl Koch and Renoir; directors of photography, Jean-Paul Alphen, Jean Bachelet, Jacques Lemare and Alain Renoir; edited by Marthe Huguet and Marguerite Renoir; music by Joseph Kosma; production designers, Max Douy and Eugène Louriè; released by Distribution Parisienne de Films.

Starring Nora Gregor (Christine de la Cheyniest), Paulette Dubost (Lisette), Marcel Dalio (Marquis Robert de la Cheyniest), Roland Toutain (André Jurieux), Jean Renoir (Octave), Mila Parély (Geneviève de Marras), Julien Carette (Marceau) and Gaston Modot (Schumacher).


france on film blogathon

THIS POST IS PART OF THE FRANCE ON FILM BLOGATHON HOSTED BY SUMMER OF SERENDIPITOUS ANACHRONISMS .

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The Grand Illusion (1937, Jean Renoir)

I can’t figure out who Renoir had in mind when he made Grand Illusion. It goes without saying he placed incredible trust in his audience, but his expectations are somewhat beyond anything else I’ve seen. Grand Illusion is a film with events–momentous, important events–but they pass without comment, without any recognition or identification. The events tend to be big enough the viewer can recognize them, but Renoir’s characters either process them offscreen or silently.

There are some obvious examples, like the one officer sacrificing himself so others can escape and it never once being acknowledged. When he comes up again, the escapees immediately stop talking about him (in fear of it being a downer of a conversation). Renoir fills the film with moments of unstated significance, but he takes it to a technical, storytelling level too. In one scene, characters get on a train, there’s a long montage of shots presumably from the train windows, followed by a new place with the characters arriving. Except over a year has passed and the characters have been in multiple other prison camps in the missing months and the viewer doesn’t even find out about it for five minutes into this new section. It manages to be confusing without disorienting–I’ve seen the film twice before and it still threw me for a little loop.

Since Grand Illusion, many war films have used a fractured narrative with style-heavy tactics to comment on war’s disorder. But these films tend to do it visually. I’m not aware of any other war film with Grand Illusion‘s approach–Renoir doesn’t say anything to the viewer, doesn’t request any participation from the viewer, doesn’t encourage him or her to engage with the material. Instead, Renoir tells the story in a way indifferent to the audience. All fiction exists in some state without reader interaction, but Grand Illusion is one of the few completely disinterested in what that interaction might generate. It’s kind of crazy, I suppose, but it works and Renoir knows it does.

The cast–Jean Gabin, Julien Carette, Marcel Dalio, Pierre Fresnay, Erich von Stroheim–is perfect. In the first part of the film, Renoir relies a great deal on Carette for humor, while weighing Gabin done (Gabin can, of course, handle it). The second part relies greatly on the relationships between Fresnay and von Stroheim and Fresnay and Gabin. Fresnay and von Stroheim are two aristocratic officers, leftovers from the previous century, whose kinship is the only one Renoir points out. Gabin and Fresnay, who’ve been together the entire film, don’t have that connection. Their scenes in this stage, where they process the significance of class in modern warfare, are somewhat tragic and glorious.

The last part of the film, with German widow Dita Parlo taking in Gabin and company, is probably Grand Illusion at it’s most traditional. It shouldn’t feel like an organic progression, but does. Renoir doesn’t exactly talk about the things he hasn’t been able to mention in the other sections; he shows them instead. For the first time in the film since the first scene, Gabin plays the leading man. First-billed, he’s rarely the most important person in the film. His scenes with Parlo, which–again–should be Grand Illusion at its most awkward or weakest, are wonderful. Renoir handles them gently, tragically hopeful. Along with the film’s final scene, they make Grand Illusion nearly optimistic.

Orson Welles called this film the one he’d save. It makes sense.

4/4★★★★

CREDITS

Directed by Jean Renoir; written by Charles Spaak and Renoir; director of photography, Christian Matras; edited by Marthe Huguet and Marguerite Renoir; music by Joseph Kosma; produced by Albert Pinkovitch and Frank Rollmer; released by Réalisation d’art cinématographique.

Starring Jean Gabin (Lt. Maréchal), Dita Parlo (Elsa), Pierre Fresnay (Capt. de Boeldieu), Erich von Stroheim (Capt. von Rauffenstein), Julien Carette (Cartier), Georges Péclet (le serrurier), Werner Florian (Sgt. Arthur), Jean Dasté (the teacher), Sylvain Itkine (Lt. Demolder), Gaston Modot (the engineer) and Marcel Dalio (Lt. Rosenthal).

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How to Steal a Million (1966, William Wyler)

I think I might hate ‘cute.’ Or at least the pseudo-realistic ‘cute’ that permeated film through the 1950s and 1960s, when the films became so much about enjoying the actors’ charisma, there was no sense of any reality to the films’ situations and conflicts. In that way, How to Steal a Million is an interesting companion to Sneakers. Sneakers is still a real film, How to Steal a Million is not….

The film’s mildly charming–Audrey Hepburn’s in it, after all–but the first half is too long. The second half, which switches focus to Peter O’Toole is better, but probably only because it contains the heist scene (the heist genre has since learned, when doing ‘cute,’ have a heist at the beginning too, to set high expectations for the final caper). I suppose what’s most wrong with the film is William Wyler. It feels like he’s doing a light comedy and knows it. The film hasn’t got anything to say about… anything. It’s either treading water or paying for scotch. As it comes right after The Collector in his filmography, it almost looks like it has to be scotch money.

I’ve seen the film before, years and years ago, and I remembered it being a lot better. I’d forgotten Wyler directed it, however, which is hardly a good sign. The most stunning thing about the film is probably that Hepburn was thirty-seven when she made it. The only sign of her age might be the eye-shadow… and I suppose it did make me want to watch Wait Until Dark again. Blond-haired, blue-eyed O’Toole leaves no impression….