Impressed by Anton Walbrook's performance in Masquerade in Vienna,and taken by Daniel Gélin's work in the magical Rendezvous in July,I was thrilled to discover that auteur film maker Julien Duvivier had teamed them up (with the classy Madeleine Robinson) which led to me getting ready to enter the courtroom.
The plot:
Hearing about a court case that his dad was involved in 2 years before he was born, Etzel Andergast discovers that his dad was one of the lawyers in the "Maurizius affair" that was a major case which led to Léonard Maurizius being put in jail for the murder of his wife Elisabeth.Opening up the old casebooks and tracking down some of the witnesses,Etzel begins to have grave doubts about the evidence shown to the jury,as he goes in search of a mysterious figure at the centre of the case: Grégoire Waremme.
View on the film:
Caked in a scraggy beard, Anton Walbrook gives a great performance as Grégoire Waremme,whose eyes Walbrook squeezes shut and curdling voice cast an almost monstrous light on Waremme.Left on his own in a cell, Daniel Gélin gives a cherished performance as Léonard,with Gélin's giving Léonard's time with Elisabeth (played by an eye- catching Madeleine Robinson) an alluring quality,which is fractured by the Film Noir heart of darkness slowly tearing Léonard apart.
Based on Jakob Wassermann's own book,the screenplay by writer/director Julien Duvivier smoothly blends the dramatic courtroom Drama with the impending doom of Film Noir. Skirting round the possibility of presenting the evidence in a dry manner, Duvivier delivers the case against his major theme of a brittle Film Noir landscape,where brilliantly pulled out flashbacks peel away at the horrifying miscarriage of justice that has taken place.
Bringing attention to "flaws" in the case,director Julien Duvivier & cinematographer Robert Lefebvre superbly close off the witness stand with a charcoal backdrop which draws attention to the smallest facial movement of the person in the witness stand.Casting shivering shadows over the Maurizius's tragic past, Duvivier brings Film Noir to court in a dazzling manner,as stylish,layers of frenzied images brings the years he has spent in jail crashing down on Léonard Maurizius shoulder,who finds that his existence is on trial.
The plot:
Hearing about a court case that his dad was involved in 2 years before he was born, Etzel Andergast discovers that his dad was one of the lawyers in the "Maurizius affair" that was a major case which led to Léonard Maurizius being put in jail for the murder of his wife Elisabeth.Opening up the old casebooks and tracking down some of the witnesses,Etzel begins to have grave doubts about the evidence shown to the jury,as he goes in search of a mysterious figure at the centre of the case: Grégoire Waremme.
View on the film:
Caked in a scraggy beard, Anton Walbrook gives a great performance as Grégoire Waremme,whose eyes Walbrook squeezes shut and curdling voice cast an almost monstrous light on Waremme.Left on his own in a cell, Daniel Gélin gives a cherished performance as Léonard,with Gélin's giving Léonard's time with Elisabeth (played by an eye- catching Madeleine Robinson) an alluring quality,which is fractured by the Film Noir heart of darkness slowly tearing Léonard apart.
Based on Jakob Wassermann's own book,the screenplay by writer/director Julien Duvivier smoothly blends the dramatic courtroom Drama with the impending doom of Film Noir. Skirting round the possibility of presenting the evidence in a dry manner, Duvivier delivers the case against his major theme of a brittle Film Noir landscape,where brilliantly pulled out flashbacks peel away at the horrifying miscarriage of justice that has taken place.
Bringing attention to "flaws" in the case,director Julien Duvivier & cinematographer Robert Lefebvre superbly close off the witness stand with a charcoal backdrop which draws attention to the smallest facial movement of the person in the witness stand.Casting shivering shadows over the Maurizius's tragic past, Duvivier brings Film Noir to court in a dazzling manner,as stylish,layers of frenzied images brings the years he has spent in jail crashing down on Léonard Maurizius shoulder,who finds that his existence is on trial.