User Reviews

This is yet another non-Continental film produced during the Occupation or, if you prefer, produced during the time of the Vichy puppet government fronted by a Marechal Petain who doubled as a Mr. Punch whose strings were pulled by Berlin. The Vichy factor is only of interest to those who like a little more flesh on the bones but it's of interest to me because another non-Continental film was produced that year (which was, incidentally, 1943 and not 1942 but we have learned to overlook this type of inaccuracy from IMDb) and both have been discussed in 'Petainist' terms. The other film was Jean Gremillon's La Ciel est a vous (which IMDb has listed as 1944) and the fact that both movies featured strong female leads has given rise to speculation that they may be 1) diametrically opposed views of the 'Petainist' female or 2) an amalgamation of both. We need to be clear from the outset that La Ciel est a vous is light years ahead of Le Voile bleu but then why shouldn't it be; Gremillon was a far superior director to journeyman Stelli and he was working from a script from the best in the business, Charles Spaak, with an assist from Albert Valentin an excellent writer-director, whilst Stelli was working with Francois-who he?-Crampax, a journeyman writer with several domestic credits. In terms of leading ladies I wouldn't want to choose between Madeleine Renaud and Gaby Morlay; Renaud was Gremillon's favourite actress and was a great actress in anyone's book but Morlay is not exactly chopped liver if anyone asks you. As the credits rolled I found it hard to confine my pulse to double figures; Elvire Popescu, Andre Alerme, Fernand Charpin, Pierre Larquey, Jeanne Fusier-Gir, Noel Roquevert and Mona Dol, virtually the backbone of French 'character' actors in the 30s and 40s. If Madeleine Renaud represented the 'Petainist' get-up-and-go female (in addition to being a wife and mother she was also a record-breaking aviatrix), i.e. 'women must be prepared to assume male roles in these straitened times' then Morlay - having lost in quick succession a husband and a child she devotes her life selflessly to what Alan Herbert described in song as Other People's Babies, for which by way of thanks she gets kicked in the metaphorical balls - is the other aspect, 'woman as nurturer of future French soldiers'. We still wind up with 'is it a good film or not' unless we are paid-up members of the Academic-Pseud axis in which case we 'discuss' interminably in 'Film School' and/or write term papers incessantly. For the record it's as fine a tear-jerker as Sirk ever made and a great chance to see some of France's finest supporting actors in one film.