Fantomas Redux

My Teleport City review of Andre Hunebelle's 1966 fumetti adaptation Fantomas has been given a second life over at Mezzanotte. As you would expect from webmaster Keith Allison, Mezzanotte is a site steeped in European decadence, and Fantomas, in all his various forms, is right at home there. Check it out, won't you?

Fantomas vs. Scotland Yard (France, 1967)

That a blue-headed super criminal piloting a rocket launched from the tower of a gothic castle is something that cannot be presented without tongue in cheek is an attitude not exclusive to the mid-1960s, although it is the most inevitable there. That said, we have to take what we can get. True, Fantomas vs. Scotland Yard, the final in French director Andre Hunebelle’s trilogy of mid-century Fantomas films, is also the silliest, yet it also represents a return of sorts to Fantomas’ roots. The film presents us with an “old dark house” scenario similar to that seen in the first sound treatment of the character, 1932’s Fantomas, which was itself based on Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre’s first Fantomas novel. As such, the perennial super villain manages to retain some of his menace despite all of the tomfoolery on display, as, like in that earlier film, he is an ominous, unseen presence for much of the story, terrorizing his victims from the shadows as more of an idea than an actual flesh and blood man.

This time out, Fantomas is subjecting some of the wealthiest men in the world to an exorbitant “life tax”, an amount that they must pay him annually for the simple privilege of not being murdered by him. One of these men, Lord Rashley (Jean-Roger Caussimon), knowing an excuse for a party when he sees it, invites all of his fellow extortionees to a soiree at his gloomy, fog enshrouded old Scottish castle. With an eye toward drawing Fantomas out, he also invites Fantomas’ nemesis, the reporter Fandor (series regular Jean Marais) and his photographer girlfriend Helene (Mylene Christophe, likewise). Also on the guest list is Comissaire Juve, the man who has made repeatedly failing to capture Fantomas his life’s work.

Juve, as in Hunebelle’s two previous Fantomas films, is portrayed by comic actor Louis de Funes, who again plays him as a pompous, self-regarding martinet who flies into hysterical pieces at the slightest pressure. Fantomas, working behind the scenes, makes the best of this high strung nature by rigging Juve’s guest room with a series of spook show contrivances, from hanging corpses to cheesy man-in-sheet ghosts. Each time, Juve reliably goes on a frantic tear through the castle’s corridors, loudly announcing to all the guests the horrors he has witnessed, only to have them all dutifully file into his room to see absolutely nothing. In between, the guests busy themselves with séances, games of cards and hushed speculation about Fantomas’ whereabouts and motives.

Meanwhile, a consortium of gangsters whom Fantomas has also subjected to the tax decide to seek an alliance with Lord Rashley and his group in order to present some kind of united front against Fantomas. Unfortunately for them, by the time they reach Rashley, he has, unknown to them, been murdered and replaced by Fantomas. During a climactic fox hunt, Fantomas tasks his black masked minions with abducting and imprisoning some of Rashley’s guests to show them that he means business (an end to which his men employ a dog in a fox costume). At the same time, Rashley’s assistant Berthier (Henri Serre), who is having an affair with Rashley’s wife, attempts to kill Rashley/Fantomas, tearing off his mask in the process. Fantomas kills Berthier and is witnessed by Helene doing so. Fantomas’ men chase her down and capture her, necessitating that Fandor – who has been lying pretty low up to this point – spring into action to rescue her. At this point, Fantomas vs. Scotland Yard sheds its genteel trappings and becomes more what we’ve come to expect from the previous films, spotlighting a runaway remote-controlled bed, an underground lair, and that manned rocket I mentioned launching from one of the castle’s towers.

As wearying as the 60s fever for camp may be, I have to admit that Fantomas vs. Scotland Yard is a very entertaining film: breezy, brisk, colorful, and, yes, even funny. It is also very well made, with high production values and excellent cinematography by Marcel Grignon (the equestrian scenes are especially well shot). It’s one of those films that give us the infrequent pleasure of seeing what is traditionally B movie material -- masked villains, haunted castles, cliffhanger thrills -- given A list treatment. And what character could be more deserving of such treatment than Fantomas, he of such purring decadence and regal sense of entitlement to all the world’s riches? As always, Hunebelle scores a coup with the casting of the suave Jean Marais as both Fantomas and Fandor, which is the only way to insure that these films’ protagonist could be remotely as cool as their villain.

It’s inevitable that some ambitious young director will eventually give us a grittier version of Fantomas, complete with a deep, tragic backstory awash in CGI blood spatter – and that I will be prompted to then look misty eyed at all of Hunebelle’s reflexive goofiness. For, indeed, there’s a loss in the fact that we’ve replaced that era’s need to regard such Comic book creations from behind a cupped palm with a need to take them deadly serious. What really matters in the end is that, whatever their attitude, those involved have sincere affection for the material -- which, in Hunebelle and company’s case, is abundantly clear.

Fantomas (France, 1932)

The 1932 version of Fantomas is far from the first film to feature the celebrated French antihero, though it is, as far as I know, the first sound film to do so. Based on the first Fantomas novel by authors Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre, its first half takes the warmly familiar form of an “old dark house” thriller, and as such requires no knowledge of Fantomas lore to be casually enjoyed.

We begin with a group of silly rich people who are stuck in a remote castle, the property of one Marquise de Langrune (Marie-Laure). As we join them, they are working themselves into a right dither discussing the exploits of the shadowy master criminal Fantomas, and have managed to convince themselves that they are surely his next target. Fortunately, there is one among them with the common sense to point out the unlikelihood that, out of all the dithering rich people in France, Fantomas would settle upon them. Then another counters by pointing out the priceless necklace worn by the Princess Danidoff (Anielka Elter) and the fact that their hostess is poised to make a million dollar cash transaction that very night with Lord Beltham (Jean Worms) and they are back to dithering. Then, as if summoned like the Candy Man, a note appears from Fantomas decreeing that one of them will be murdered at midnight that very night. And I don’t’ need smell-o-vision to know that this quavering lot are now totally shitting themselves.

As well they should, as, come midnight, Fantomas, clad in a black mask and body stocking, appears in the Marquise’s bedroom and strangles her. Making off with her cash, he then attacks the Princess and Lord Beltham, who both appear to recognize him. The Princess faints and, shortly thereafter, after a cursory examination by a visiting doctor, is proclaimed to have “hysterical catalepsy”, thus necessitating we wait for her to come to before finding out if she really knows Fantomas’ identity. Soon thereafter, Fantomas’ nemesis, Inspector Juve, shows up on the scene, having also been summoned by a note from Fantomas. He and his bumbling assistant then make the rounds of the place, discovering all manner of hidden doorways and secret corridors, before officially declaring Fantomas escaped.

With this episode closed, Fantomas then veers from the gothic mood of its first act into more straightforward procedural territory, with Juve making his rounds and collecting evidence that brings him ever closer to learning Fantomas’ identity. Played by Thomy Bourdelle, Juve is far less of a figure of fun here than he would be in Andre Hunebelle’s farcical Fantomas films of the 1960s, where the character was played by the beloved comedian Louis de Funes. Still, something about the smug self regard displayed by Bourdelle’s Juve tells us that we are being invited to root for Fantomas, a flamboyant foil to the arrogance of authority, not to mention rampant upper class twittery. It also should be noted that one of the defining aspects of Juve’s character, throughout the series, is that he is again and again proven incapable of catching Fantomas.

Fantomas was directed by Pal Fejos, a Hungarian born director who, not long before, had done a stint in Hollywood, helming a string of pictures for Universal. He also, before that, studied under Fritz Lang. That tutelage seems to have served him well in Fantomas, especially in the shadowy, jump scare-ridden confines of its opening scenes, which are satisfyingly expressionistic and moody. Yet Fejos also proves himself a steady hand in the film’s second half, which is comparatively sunny and action packed. A car race and a climactic fight involving a lot of broken furniture, in particular, are lensed with a lot of verve, suggesting the breakneck, go for broke aesthetic of an old Republic serial.

To those familiar with the Fantomas mythos, I doubt that it will count as much of a spoiler (and to the rest of you: spoiler) that, at the end of Fejos’ Fantomas, the arch criminal manages to slip from the clutches of the authorities. A resolute Juve swears to catch him next time and, indeed, Fantomas itself seems poised to go another round. After all, Louis Feuillade’s series of silent Fantomas serials lasted through five entries. Nonetheless, it appears that Fantomas wouldn’t again receive feature treatment until 1946, when Marcel Herrand and Simone Signoret would go through the paces of introducing the character all over again to cinema audiences.

Since then, Fantomas’ screen incarnations have returned at periodic intervals, like a passing comet. In fact, it seems that we’re due for another one any day now (despite the proposed version from Silent Hill’s Christophe Gans running aground not too long ago thanks to a recalcitrant Vincent Cassel). Whatever version does come, however, we can count on it being a lot louder, more violent, more winkingly self referential and CG filled than Pal Fejo’s statelier take on the subject. Consider this pleasant little film, then, a sort of vaccine against what’s to come.

Dharmendra vs. Fantomas

Saazish (India, 1975)The Bollywood action thriller Saazish is sloppily constructed, incoherent, low budget trash. But it's also kind of fun if you're in the right mood. More importantly, it provides the answer to a question posed by Keith on the Teleport City forum many, many months ago -- that question being, "Who the heck is that blue guy on the cover of the Bombay the Hard Way, Volume 2: Electric Vindaloo CD?" Well it turns out that he is Saazish's chief heavy, Mr. Han (or, if you're Jim Kelly, Mr. Han Man), who is clearly inspired by the venerable French pulp villain Fantomas (who made an equally copyright-flaunting appearance in the 1969 Turkish film Iron Claw the Pirate).
The first half of Saazish takes place in Hong Kong, where Indian beauty queen Sunita (Saira Banu) has just won the title of Miss Cosmos. With barely enough time to bask in the warm attentions of the painfully stiff, English-speaking representatives of the press swarming around her, she is whisked away to perform her first order of duty, which is to present the trophy at an international racing competition. Here she meets and instantly falls in love with hunky race car driver Rai (Dharmendra). This leads to her relentlessly stalking him all over the island and singing at him, with the predictable--by Bollywood standards--result that he eventually wears down and falls hard for her, as well. (I was glad to at least see a gender reversal in this scenario, for once.)

All goes swimmingly, until a fateful trip on the ferry results in Sunita inadvertently learning of an international criminal gang's plot to smuggle two billion dollars worth of stolen gold out of the country. This, in turn, results in Sunita being relentlessly hunted down by the gang, which includes Madan Puri--making about as convincing a Chinese as Warner Oland--playing a character called Mr. Wong. Separated from his lady love, Rai is captured by the gang and taken to the big boss, Mr. Han. Somewhat surprisingly, Rai offers to kill Sunita himself (I mean, that breathy, Jane Mansfield impersonation that Saira Banu is doing is pretty annoying) in exchange for his life and a sizable chunk of cash. But is Rai on the level, or is this just a clever ruse? Rai's uncle (Iftekhar) is an inspector for Interpol, after all. Or IS he? Finally, Rai convinces Sunita to flee the country with him on a cruise ship, which happens to be the very cruise ship on which the gold is being smuggled. Also on board is the predictable assortment of eccentric characters, including, happily, Helen as both the ship's onboard entertainer and the film's delightful locus of female villainy.
Like International Crook before it, Saazish appears to have been filmed over a long period of time, with Dharmendra's girth, hair and acting style frequently changing dramatically from shot to shot. While this practice is not radical to the point of providing the dizzying sense of hopping back-and-forth through time that International Crook did, it does contribute to the film having a cobbled together feel, as if it was assembled from parts of two or three different films. Furthermore, much of the technical execution shows clear evidence of haste: For instance, the stunningly lazy use of rear projection in an early chase scene that makes Saira Banu's car appear to be traveling sideways through traffic--or the opening car race, which offers some of the most ham-handed blending of stock and studio-shot footage I've seen.

Still, the film has enough of a balance of scrappy energy and affably goofy elements to make it entertaining for the undemanding viewer... or, to be more specific, me. In fact, it's worth watching simply to behold Dharmendra, as only he can, throwing his hands on his hips, puffing out his chest, and telling Fantomas what time it is.

File under: SOLVED!