Ladies' Paradise (Au bonheur des dames, 1930): What a film to go out on! I have a lot of thoughts about this one, let’s see if I can get them out in any kind of coherent fashion.
Starting with the basis of the film: this is a silent melodrama based on a 19th century realist novel. It’s going to be pitched to the rafters in terms of emotion. I don’t know Zola from Zyrtec, but he seems to be one of those novelists well-regarded and popular in the past (but now mostly unread) who trafficked in social issues wrapped up in literary ribbons and melodramatic bows so as to appeal to the very bourgeois readers they were criticizing. Like Theodore Dreiser. And so it makes sense that this film brings to mind the great adaptation of a Dreiser novel,
A Place in the Sun (and, to some extent, Paramount’s flop follow-up,
Carrie) in that huge social issues are played out through interpersonal relationships with devastating consequences (for the underclasses at least).
Here we’re talking mass market capitalism vs. small business; the moneyed class vs. the workers; how capitalism has no room for the old, the infirm, the weakly human and no patience for sentiment. We’ve got the old, independent shop owner being crushed by the huge new department store across the street (which is in turn under the heel of its wealthy, amoral financier) and the improbable romance between the shop owner’s niece (fresh from the country) and the sophisticated proprietor of the department store.
I don’t want to talk much about what else happens in the plot because I think the film would be best enjoyed in a state of total ignorance of and openness to what happens. But I will say that the ending had me thinking,
“What? You can’t be serious!” and then Duvivier tops a too-sweet conclusion with caramel, whipped cream, sprinkles, and a candied cherry, and the film launches into the stratosphere of irony and you realize the film has been a dish of poison the whole time. Like, it’s absolutely preposterous and perfectly cynical at the same time. There’s no way Duvivier was not fully aware of what he was doing here, as the whole film builds up to it.
A quote that’s been echoing around in my head during the whole week of watching these films is Oscar Wilde’s withering assessment of the oozing sentimentality of Dickens’ novels: “One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing.” And that seems to sum up Duvivier at his best, a sort of precursor to (though really a contemporary of) Douglas Sirk, having his melodramatic cake and eating it, too.
This is a perfect bookend to this selection of films as it shows the evolution of Duvivier’s visual style from flashy, experimental camera effects (like the trick mirror shots, the superimpositions) to more sophisticated, narrative-driven innovations like handheld tracking shots, elaborate staging, associative and expressive editing, and complicated camera movements. Yet both this film and
Poil de carotte are based on highly emotional yet realist 19th century literature and are both somewhat “coming of age” stories (or, more accurately, “reaching a new stage of clear-eyed emotional maturity” stories). And the full set, even though chronological in order, is sequenced as well as a good album—a great opener, a variety of lesser but interesting tracks in different tempos and styles, and a surprising and explosive finale.
And now for the crass, purely subjective, gut reaction numerical ranking (which is on a scale of “absolutely fucking incredible” to “merely quite good”):
1. (tie) Poil de carotte, Le Bonheur des Dames
3. La Divine Croisière
4. Le Tourbillon de Paris
5. Le Mystère de la tour Eiffel
6. Maman Colibri
7. La Vie miraculeuse de Thérèse Martin
8. L'Agonie de Jérusalem
9. Le mariage de mademoiselle Beulemans
