Topaze

The most famous of the three movies Louis Gasnier made in France .Although France is his native country,the main body of his work is American .

Based on a Marcel Pagnol play , this is another Jouvet 's triumph ; the author remade "Topaze" in 1950 ,but it was overlong (135 min) and cannot be ranked among the director's greatest achievements .Besides, Fernandel lacked cynicism, wickedness ,was too full of bonhomie to portray the teacher-turned- businessman successfully .

Jouvet's performance is brilliant ,and against all odds ,the fifties version has not aged as well as this one.Jouvet was a stage/pictures genius (recently ,they dared to remake " knock" whereas his portrayal was close to perfect) : here his metamorphosis is stunning:from a bashful ,colorless and conscientious teacher to the elegant smart calculating frontman who eventually teaches his boss who's in charge here.

In the Muche boarding-school,moral proverbs are written on the classroom walls:"money can't buy happiness ""ill-gotten gains seldom prosper "; Topaze does believe in what he teaches ; after being sacked by his contemptuous headmaster, his naivete inspires a corrupt city council man with confidence ,and little by little,he learns the tricks of the trade :the humiliated teacher whose ignorance of business was taked for granted, shows himself more ambitious and more cynical than those who used to look down on him.

Jouvet gets strong support from Edwige Feuillère and Pierre Larquey :the former is a self-interested seductress who shines in the scene when she passes herself off as a victim of fate whose life would be ruined if the frontman revealed the truth.The latter is a good guy ,a teacher who still believes in education ,but his last line (which could be that of recent comedies) calls his future into question.