User Reviews

Billy Wilder began Sunset Boulevard with a shot of the morgue in Hollywood; one by one the stiffs started talking amongst themselves explaining how they wound up with tags on their toes but when they sneaked it the punters didn't get it and started laughing so they junked the whole sequence. That same year, 1950, Christian Jacque began his Souvenirs Perdus in a Lost Property Office; the camera pans the objects and eventually four of them - a statue of Osiris, a funeral wreath, a scarf and a violin - relate their own stories of how they came to be there. The compendium movie enjoyed something of a vogue in the late forties/early fifties; technically it had its roots in Dead Of Night, in 1945 but it was about three years later that the success of 'Quartet' led to a couple of sequels, 'Trio' and 'Encore' which, like 'Quartet' were adaptations of short stories by Willie Maugham. There was also something called 'Easy Money' and over in Hollywood Fox weighed in with 'Full House' five stories by O'Henry. Not to be outdone Max Ophuls adapted three stories by Guy De Maupassant into 'Le Plaisir' but it was Christian Jacque who prevailed upon two of the greatest screenplay writers in French cinema, Jacques Prevert and Henri Jeanson, to come up with a compendium film and the result was 'Souvenirs Perdus', four stories, the first and fourth by Prevert, the second and third by Jeanson (or LARGELY by Prevert and Jeanson inasmuch as others were involved. After establishing the Lost Property Office the camera pans along the rows and rows of lost and/or discarded items and, as stated, four of them become verbose and lay their stories on us. First up is a statue of Osiris, a reproduction of the one in the Egyptian Room of the Louvre who was minding his own business one day when two old lovers happened to meet in front of it and proceed to lie to each other. Pierre Brasseur is not, as he claims, an architect, but scrapes a living hustling 'dirty' French postcards to gullible tourists whilst Edwige Feuilliere may be dressed to the nines and dripping with diamonds but it is only on loan for a fashion shoot. Nevertheless they spend a bittersweet night together and then part. It was a masterstroke to cast Feuilliere, one of the shining lights of French cinema at that time along with Micheline Presle, Arletty, Danielle Darrieux, et al, though Pierre Brasseur isn't exactly chopped liver if anybody asks you. Next up is a funeral wreath, utilised for the final journey of a not-much-missed uncle of playboy Francis Perier. Shortly before the funeral a discarded girlfriend, Suzy Delair, in whom he has no further interest, shows up at his apartment and Perier gets his manservant, Armand, to let on that the wreath is for his own funeral. A reasonable ploy but naturally it backfires when Delair turns up at the graveside and floods the joint giving the mourners pause as the corps was anything but a ladies man. The third object, a scarf, was used to strangle a young girl, Daniele Delorme; Gerard Philippe was reasonably wealthy and was blessed with a bunch of relatives who couldn't wait for him to croak so had him committed to an asylum the easier to get at his money. Managing to escape he makes it his business to track them down one by one and ensure that they get it where the chicken got the axe. In the midst of all this he meets Delorme on a bridge from which she is about to Brody. Perhaps foolishly he prevents her, she takes him home, he falls asleep, wakes to find her gone, figures she's blown the whistle on him and when she returns with the provisions she's been to buy he loses it and strangles her. This sequence is all quirky angles and mirror shots and is, by far, the most dramatic of the four. Last up is 'The Violin' and for me this was the selling point for it features not only Yves Montand but an uncredited Henri Crolla, who was Montand's personal guitarist until his tragically early death. Montand plays a street singer always falling foul of the law in the shape of Bernard Blier who offers him a deal. Blier is in love with a widow but he has a rival; the widow has a young son who plays - and I use the word loosely, the violin. Blier figures if he gets Montand to coach the kid he'll score brownie points with the widow and leave his rival with egg on his face. Naturally once Montand hears the kid all bets are off. Bizarrely Prevert allows Blier to begin singing his (Prevert's) own 'Les Feuilles Mortes' before Montand, in jail at the time, finishes it. Later Montand gives us Prevert's Tournesol. Thirty one at the time Montand's voice was in its prime and for buffs this is a real standout - I, for one, as arguably the number #1 Montand buff would cheerfully (if necessary) forfeit the other three segments and keep just The Violin despite it being essentially fluff. In its wisdom Rene Château have just released this on DVD and it is now an integral part of my collection.