Known for creating some of the most important films in French history, and during Nazi Occupation, no less, Criterion issues two of Marcel Carne’s most widely acclaimed masterpieces, his crowning achievement, Children of Paradise (1945), which, if you haven’t seen, you need to, and a noteworthy work that directly precedes it, Les Visiteurs du Soir (1942), which has long since been popularly interpreted as an allegory of the hostile occupation. While this interpretation is hardly surprising and seems rather fitting, Carne’s film is much more universal than that, instead conveying the unbreakable spirit of pure love. Presented like the dark, harsh fairy tale it is, Carne managed to create a sumptuously poetic, luxurious film about how love does not indeed conquer all, but can perhaps endure.
Pages flipped by a dark gloved hand inform us that our tale is set in the Middle Ages, May of 1485. Two of the devil’s envoys,...
Pages flipped by a dark gloved hand inform us that our tale is set in the Middle Ages, May of 1485. Two of the devil’s envoys,...
- 9/25/2012
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
When the British Film Institute was just getting started releasing DVDs, it was a surprise to come across La kermesse héroïque (a.k.a. The Heroic Surrender, a.k.a. Carnival in Flanders, 1935), a good, odd film probably not on many people's must-have lists, or at least not until it became possible for them to have it. Happily, the BFI has gone on digging up curios from the past, notably with its Flipside series of obscure British films from the 60s.
Jacques Feyder's film, based on a story by top scenarist Charles Spaak, tells of a Dutch town in 1616, on the even of its carnival celebrations, discovering itself threatened by invasion from the Spanish. The Burgomaster (André Alerme) and the town's most prominent citizens are aghast at the carnage likely to be wrought, and after they describe the rape and baby-slaying in detail, Feyder cuts to a fantasy insert depicting,...
Jacques Feyder's film, based on a story by top scenarist Charles Spaak, tells of a Dutch town in 1616, on the even of its carnival celebrations, discovering itself threatened by invasion from the Spanish. The Burgomaster (André Alerme) and the town's most prominent citizens are aghast at the carnage likely to be wrought, and after they describe the rape and baby-slaying in detail, Feyder cuts to a fantasy insert depicting,...
- 2/10/2012
- MUBI
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