Le cinéma sous l'occupation, avant et après-guerre

Three parts,as given on the title ,and one more time ,hats off to Tavernier who restores to favor forgotten or despised great movies.

1)Before the war ,directors escaping from their lands (communism,Nazism ) took refuge in France ,much to many local directors' (Lherbier, Feyder) displeasure.Tavernier chose two of them:

-Russian Tourjansky whose "La Peur" he highly praises ;I do not share his enthusiasm but "Le Mensonge De Maria Petrovna " which I have not seen seems appealing.

-German Siodmak is well known for his American career features Film Noir masterpieces;Tavernier 's sequence deals with his two final French movies ,the best he offered in Renoir's country .

"Mollenard" ,which remained unsung for a long time , but now estimated at its true value: partly an exotic thriller ,it also paints the bourgeois society in a vitriolic style : "the captain and his terrifying missus are separated by an ocean but united by hatred".THe movie tramples religion and honors (the sailor's return)underfoot .The harrowing last sequence is shown.

"Pièges" (remade by Sirk as "lured " ) is closer to thriller ;IMHO ,Tavernier does not chose the best moments : Von Stroheim's sequence should be longer and I do not agree with him ,as far as Maurice Chevalier is concerned ,neither him,nor his songs belong to a suspenseful movie ,the climax of which remains the final scenes with Pierre Renoir.

2)During the war : Although he does not consider the occupation days a "Age D'Or" (how could it be in a humiliated country?) Tavernier mentions a series of classics (many of them are given a longer appreciation in the other episodes of his voyage).It was a time the Jews' names were erased in the cast and credits.This part highlights three works:

"La Main Du Diable "by Maurice Tourneur, ,one of the rare French successful attempt at a fantasy and horror movie , "creates in its first scene 30 characters or more" .Personally ,I have always thought that it influenced his son Jack for his own "curse of the demon" .

"La Vie De Plaisir " by Albert Valentin ,a virulent attack on social conventions and religion;one can wonder,however ,why Tavernier did not show the blessing of the pack of hunting dogs and why he did not mention "Marie-Martine " the construction of which predates that of "memento" .

"Donne -Moi Tes Yeux " by Sacha Guitry or how special effects were reduced to a flashlight.A lesson.

3) After the war : Once again ,Tavernier keeps the best until last for he has really uncovered unsuspected gems ;the movies he 's talking about are largely overlooked (Calef's) or despised (Le Chanois)

He refuses the generally accepted ideas: " after the Liberation,all the French were resistant fighters and all the movies glorify them";in Clement's "Les Maudits " (1947) there was a collaborator journalist among the passengers of the submarine.

"Jericho" by Henri Calef -a director who would deserve a whole sequence ,maybe BT will some day-shows cowardice among a town city council .

"Retour A La vie " by Cayatte,Dreville,Clouzot .Although Cayatte's and mainly Clouzot's segments are the best ,Tavernier aptly chose a sequence of Dreville's first segment which told how "resistant fighters took over ....a metro station one hour before Leclerc 's army's arrival".

The episode ends with a welcome reappraisal of Jean -Paul Le Chanois's early films ,the Bête Noire of the young Turks;this educated man's good movies were tarnished by association with his mediocre flicks which came later. But ,as Tavernier points out ,it is no reason to neglect the splendid "L'Ecole Buissonnière " and the endearing populist " Sans Laisser D'Adresse " ,"the only movie of the era which showed a labor-union meeting" (the director was a communist).

Another absorbing episode of Tavernier's voyage.