French Cancan

"French Cancan" is one of my favorite all time movies. It's an excellent film. There's color, there's humor, there's music. It's a very good portrait of the so called Belle Époque, though Jean Renoir's priorities were always to show a creation, a fantasie. So the film isn't a historical movie. The final sequences in which the girls dance cancan are unforgettable images. It's a film you shouldn't miss.

I watched this movie three times at different ages of my life and always did enjoy it very much indeed. This Can-Can is an authentic explosion of joie de vivre, like Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly musical, but in French way. And a Jean Renoir nice tribute to his time, his friends, lovers, music and dances. It is at same time a show business chronicle of that age, full of affection and French mood. It is too a clear tribute to the Impressionism (people who likes impressionistic painters will like this picture). It is particularly a tribute to Toulouse-Lautrec and, of course, to Jean Renoir father, Pierre-Auguste. You will find hear a trustworthy and splendid colored recreation of some Renoir master work. Excellent casting, scenery, sound-effects and music. Even it tell us about the creation of Parisian Moulin Rouge, obviously it is a fiction story (and not very original by the way, as it fall down in the very well know moral that the show must go on). But the Jean Renoir production is great.

Acknowledgments to Cole Porter from whose lyric CanCan (the title song of his 1953 Broadway show of the same name) I take my one line summary. This is, purely and simply, a Valentine to Paris, the Belle Epoque, the Impressionists, you-name-it. As such it is both stunning and sumptuous.Gabin - who began in the French Music Halls - is superb, but then when isn't he, Arnoul is a revelation. More? Well, the photography is ... the music is ... the ambience is ... aw, what the hell, go see it, do yourself a great big favor. 9/10

Portrait of a time. portrait of a legend. seductive for the genius of Jean Renoir. and for the inspired performances. and, sure, for the nostalgia of the viewer. an admirable Jean Gabin and a great embroidery of love stories, show world, rivalries and triumph. optimistic, romantic. and refreshing. and that does to it a special status. like refuge, splendid show, fairy tale and confession of a lost age.

A charmingly amoral club owner sets his sights — amorous and financial — on a beautiful, naïve blue collar girl and propels her to the height of celebrity thanks to her titillating dance skills.

It may sound like a contemporary, cutting edge urban drama, but French Cancan was made in 1956 by famed director Jean Renoir. The movie — a darkish comedy with a progressive take on sexuality — chronicles the birth of the Moulin Rouge. Legendary Jean Gabin plays Danglard, a world-weary hustler, club owner and anti-hero for the ages, who makes no pretense of his philandering and amorous proclivities. He's casting about for a new lover and a new money making venture when his current club fails and he grows bored with his mistress. He discovers a beautiful young washer girl, Nini, whom he convinces to headline at his new "concept" club, the Moulin Rouge, making it a hot spot and her a celebrity before the doors even open.

It doesn't hurt that Nini's moody ex-lover — a sullen baker (le petit grump) — injures Danglard in a fight and an even moodier Russian count becomes suicidal because Nini spurns his advances. As the salacious headlines drive up public interest, they learn the club will feature the cancan in all it's thigh-revealing, petticoat-flashing, bawdy glory — a disreputable dance to begin with now fallen completely out of favor.

The movie is a riot with memorable characters, beautiful, dizzying club and dance scenes, a few titillating moments that must have pushed the limits 60 years ago and swooning French girls forever throwing themselves desperately into and out of the arms of their lovers. You almost forget that it's a musical, so seamlessly are the musical and dance scenes integrated into the plot.

Danglard's gangly side kick is hilarious as is the whistler. Most delightful of all was seeing and hearing the divine Edith Piaf on screen after listening in awe to her songs all these years.

The movie is best enjoyed with absinthe in honor of the absinthe consumed on screen — as fate would have it, we had some delightful Oregon-made absinthe that night — or lots of champagne.

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