This is my favorite film.
No way do I think it's the BEST film (although it would be on my Top 100)
But the older I get, the more GRISBI speaks to me, with its portrait of aging, friendship, subculture...
And it touches me - down deep.
I went back and purchased DVDs of some of the great Gabin films of the '30s: Pépé le Moko, Le Jour Se Lève, La Bête Humaine. I believe that the more you know how beautiful and feral Gabin was in the '30s, the more touching it is to see him in his pajamas, brushing his teeth, listening to his favorite harmonica record.
There are millions of "One Last Heist" films if we want to talk about GENRE.
But this film is on a whole other level.
Max/Gabin is exhausted, but this is the only life he knows. He plays the game - flirting, love making, slapping, shooting, escaping...He's still spry - he can still do it. Sometimes he still even seems to enjoy it.
The film is about what it's about, but it can also be seen as an analogy for many things. Gabin himself still doing it, not least of all.
We all have to keep doing it when it's the only life we know.
Another cliché: sex is rushed and provisional, and the real love exists between two men.
But Becker lavishes so much detail and care on the relationship between Max and his friend Riton that the clichés are transcended.
Besides, the relationship between Max and Riton is also based on an inequality. There is a constant assertion of Max's superiority and dominance over Riton:
"What would you do in my place, Max?"
"I'll never be in your place, you poor sot!"
Is sex, in fact, no more than just another DUTY, just another part of the construction of the Tough Guy persona for Max? Look at the scene where he has his afternoon assignation with his classy yet sexy American lover:
(she,from the bedroom)
"Vous m'aimez, Max?"
(he,outside the bedroom,thinks of Riton,lights a cigarette)
"J'arrive..."
(he walks back in)
The economy. The derision.
The film ends with the kind of fatalistic trope that I, rightly or wrongly, associate with The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. At least I guess that was the first place where I really encountered it. Everything is risked. Everything is lost.
It has been done. Before and since. But none of that changes the poignancy and power of the way that it's done here.
In the end, in order to keep going in spite of all sorts of losses, Max must continue to perform. All of his roles. A virtuoso performance, in the end as in the beginning.
He goes to the mob hangout restaurant with the American babe, he mingles,he plays his favorite harmonica tune on the jukebox one more time.
La Vie Continue
A virtuoso performance by Max AND by Gabin. And by Jacques Becker.
No way do I think it's the BEST film (although it would be on my Top 100)
But the older I get, the more GRISBI speaks to me, with its portrait of aging, friendship, subculture...
And it touches me - down deep.
I went back and purchased DVDs of some of the great Gabin films of the '30s: Pépé le Moko, Le Jour Se Lève, La Bête Humaine. I believe that the more you know how beautiful and feral Gabin was in the '30s, the more touching it is to see him in his pajamas, brushing his teeth, listening to his favorite harmonica record.
There are millions of "One Last Heist" films if we want to talk about GENRE.
But this film is on a whole other level.
Max/Gabin is exhausted, but this is the only life he knows. He plays the game - flirting, love making, slapping, shooting, escaping...He's still spry - he can still do it. Sometimes he still even seems to enjoy it.
The film is about what it's about, but it can also be seen as an analogy for many things. Gabin himself still doing it, not least of all.
We all have to keep doing it when it's the only life we know.
Another cliché: sex is rushed and provisional, and the real love exists between two men.
But Becker lavishes so much detail and care on the relationship between Max and his friend Riton that the clichés are transcended.
Besides, the relationship between Max and Riton is also based on an inequality. There is a constant assertion of Max's superiority and dominance over Riton:
"What would you do in my place, Max?"
"I'll never be in your place, you poor sot!"
Is sex, in fact, no more than just another DUTY, just another part of the construction of the Tough Guy persona for Max? Look at the scene where he has his afternoon assignation with his classy yet sexy American lover:
(she,from the bedroom)
"Vous m'aimez, Max?"
(he,outside the bedroom,thinks of Riton,lights a cigarette)
"J'arrive..."
(he walks back in)
The economy. The derision.
The film ends with the kind of fatalistic trope that I, rightly or wrongly, associate with The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. At least I guess that was the first place where I really encountered it. Everything is risked. Everything is lost.
It has been done. Before and since. But none of that changes the poignancy and power of the way that it's done here.
In the end, in order to keep going in spite of all sorts of losses, Max must continue to perform. All of his roles. A virtuoso performance, in the end as in the beginning.
He goes to the mob hangout restaurant with the American babe, he mingles,he plays his favorite harmonica tune on the jukebox one more time.
La Vie Continue
A virtuoso performance by Max AND by Gabin. And by Jacques Becker.