DOUBLE INDEMNITY - Review By Greg Klymkiw - The TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX series "Ball of Fire: The Films of Barbara Stanwyck". Curated by TIFF Senior Programmer James Quandt.

"I couldn't hear my own footsteps. It was the walk of a dead man."

Double Indemnity (1944)
Dir. Billy Wilder
Scr. Raymond Chandler & Wilder
Src. Novella by James M. Cain
Starring: Barbara Stanwyck, Fred McMurray, Edward G. Robinson, Tom Powers, Jean Heather, Byron Barr, Porter Hall, Richard Gaines

Review By Greg Klymkiw

This is one of the creepiest, most chilling film noir thrillers of all time. That after 70+ years Double Indemnity still manages to pummel us with the force of a raging bull is a testament to the genius of director-and-co-writer Billy Wilder, his dark-matter-infused screenwriting partner Raymond Chandler and James M. Cain, the original author of the novella upon which the film is based.

No matter when I've seen it, the movie never lets me down and continues to raise my goose-fleshy hackles with the same force Barbara Stanwyck's performance pumps streams of blood to engorge my, uh, appendage.

The movie begins with a car's mad dash through the streets of Los Angeles until its driver, one seemingly distraught Walter Neff (Fred McMurray) stops, slowly exits his vehicle, stumbles into an office tower, then into the domain of the Pacific All Risk Insurance Company. In the pitch black of night, not a creature is stirring, not even a mouse; though, it seems, a few weary cleaners work quietly as they sweep, vacuum, mop and wax the floors, occasionally emptying the contents of wastepaper baskets near the desks that now sit empty and silently in the vast workspace. Neff, still unsteady, carries himself along the hallways until he lunges into a dark room, slumps into a chair and flips on the dictaphone.

"You said it wasn't an accident, check.
You said it wasn't suicide, check.
You said it was murder…check." 

Neff has a story to tell, a confession if you like. His voice, filled with an odd mixture of regret and cynicism, begins to pour out the events which will comprise the vast majority of the film. It's a story rooted in lust and love, one that slowly tunnels into the muck and mire of paranoia, dreadful secrets and murder most foul.

A routine visit to remind a client (Tom Powers) that his automobile insurance is about to expire is the thing that turns Neff's life completely upside down. The client isn't home, but his wife, the shapely Phyllis Dietrichson (Stanwyck) most certainly is.

Being a man obsessed with keeping his standing as Pacific Assurance's top-flight salesman, he's had little time for love.

Lust, maybe, but Cupid's Arrow has always eluded him.

Phyllis, much younger than her hard-working oil man hubby, is trapped in a loveless marriage which she thought would yield riches, but has instead, served up an all-you-can-eat buffet of unhappiness, abuse and the most modest financial stability.

These two are primed, so to speak, for a good pump.

Phyllis: Do you make your own breakfast, Mr. Neff?
Neff: Well, I squeeze a grapefruit now and again.

Love, however, is a deadly game and a secret affair twixt Neff and Phyllis turns positively noxious when the ace salesman hatches a devious scheme based upon his confidence (due to experience) in being able to successfully pull off the ultimate insurance scam. Initially inspired and supported in his efforts by Phyllis, she of the Gorgeous Gams, lustful eyes, sexily curled lip and provocative anklet, perfect a plan that seems perfectly in the cards. If someone has life insurance, you see, there's a little clause called a "double indemnity". If the death occurs in a number of rare locales, then the payout is twice the normal amount. A tidy sum, indeed.

Nothing's ever perfect, though. Neff's best friend, mentor and bonafide father figure is the crafty, dogged insurance investigator Barton Keyes (Edward G. Robinson). Neff is more than aware that Keyes will be a tough nut to crack, but he's ultimately convinced that his dark premeditated enterprise will succeed.

"You know, you ought to take a look at the statistics on suicide some time. You might learn a little something about the insurance business… you've never read an actuarial table in your life, have you? Why they've got ten volumes on suicide alone… of all the cases on record, there's not one single case of suicide by leaping from the rear end of a moving train. And you know how fast that train was going at the point where the body was found? Fifteen miles an hour. Now how can anybody jump off a slow-moving train like that with any kind of expectation that he would kill himself?"

This is a great film. Though it captures the post-war ennui of the 40s, it's a film that still packs a punch in a contemporary context. Its protagonist, Walter Neff, unfettered by the "normal" desires of the upwardly mobile, seems to be content with his place in the world. He doesn't need love, a home with a hearth, a family, nor a desire to take to a desk-job in order to justify that he's "made it". He wants to be in the field, out in the world and finally, he takes a certain degree of pride (albeit of the laissez-faire variety) in being the Pacific All Risk Insurance Company's top salesman.

His patter to sell insurance is sprinkled with seemingly caring advice; counsel which indeed might have the potential to interfere (albeit positively) upon the lives of others, but is ultimately self-serving. It boosts his ego, his pride in selling more successfully than anyone, but most of all, Neff, as a human being seems to share the psychological portrait of a corporate entity. In the official synopsis of Mark Achbar, Joel Bakan and Jennifer Abbott's 2003 documentary The Corporation, a corporation. which is a legally constructed individual, or if you will, a "person", is defined thusly:

"The operational principles of the corporation give it a highly anti-social 'personality': it is self-interested, inherently amoral, callous and deceitful; it breaches social and legal standards to get its way; it does not suffer from guilt, yet it can mimic the human qualities of empathy, caring and altruism."

This seems to describe Neff to a "T" and yet, we like the guy. Why shouldn't we? He's a charming, oddly handsome and wryly funny human being. He sees something he wants - Phyllis - and he's willing and able to do what he needs to do to get it/her. All this said, though, the Wilder/Chandler/Cain Holy Trinity have carefully inserted enough shadings to Walter's character, which gradually reveal a man who honours friendship, wants love and is also imbued with a sense of sacrifice. It's true that he's painted himself into a kind of "the jig is up" corner, but it's a sense of both mortality and morality which work upon the un-oiled hinges of that tiny door nestled deep in his heart and sacrifice, he will, and does.

Phyllis: We're both rotten.
Neff: Only you're a little more rotten.

In many ways, it's a heartbreaker of an ending. Neff breaks the hearts of too many, including himself and he takes the ultimate plunge into seeking a kind of skewed redemption - one which we all too clearly understand. Fred McMurray is fundamentally perfect for the role of Walter Neff. It's no surprise that he eventually went on to depict the wise TV-Dad of the long running series "My Three Sons". Wilder/Chandler/Cain have created a character who fits very nicely into a cusp, one between war and post-war and yet another twixt hard-line film noir and mid-60s mainstream sentiment.

As filmmaker/critic Paul Schrader notes in his terrific essay "Notes on Film Noir", the film "… provided a bridge to the post-war phase of film noir. The unflinching noir vision of Double Indemnity came as a shock in 1944", but I'd go further and suggest it's as shocking now as it once was. We all want to believe in man's inherent goodness and though, as Schrader notes, "Double Indemnity was the first film which played film noir for what it essentially was: small-time, unredeemed, unheroic", I'd again go a step further and suggest that Neff's final act of sacrifice goes beyond all that.

There are two deep loves in the film. Firstly, there's the love between friends - Neff and Keyes. The body language between the two men and even the way they look at each other subtly betrays the notion that Neff is a true psychopath. Secondly, there's the love between old man Dietrichson's daughter Lola (Jean Heather) and her hot-headed-with-jealousy boyfriend Nino Zachetti (Byron Barr). It's a love thwarted by Lola's Dad, Phyllis and through his nefarious actions, Neff himself.

"Who'd you think I was anyway? The guy that walks into a good looking dame's front parlour and says, 'Good afternoon, I sell accident insurance on husbands. You got one that's been around too long? One you'd like to turn into a little hard cash?'"

Even Phyllis, the ultimate noir femme fatale, feels like she transcends using her charm, her seductive powers in the manner in which the Neff-Phyllis affair plays out - in secret, unconsummated, behind dark sunglasses and furtive whispers in a public supermarket where they can hide in plain sight. Stanwyck's performance is a whirlwind of sensual/evil force, but in her final confrontation with Neff, she's as cold and calculating as she's also tinged with a bitter regret, clearly inspired by the entire abnormal set-up of seeking to make love a reality.

Neff's narration of the tale has the same impact as Wilder's use of narration much later in Sunset Boulevard. Schrader defines the narration of film noir as being imbued with "an irretrievable past, a predetermined fate and an all-enveloping hopelessness." The sad and salient difference is that Sunset Boulevard is brilliantly narrated by a literal dead man, but the earlier and equally powerful Double Indemnity is narrated by a dying man, or rather, a man facing the inevitability of death, a life wasted save for his sacrifice for a love between two people that might only have been achieved by his acts of deception and murder.

And this, maybe more than anything, is why Double Indemnity is truly and virtually unequivocal in its greatness. The immoral actions of one man lead to sacrifice, which in turn leads to love. If this isn't as cynical as it is profoundly and deeply moving, nothing is.

The Film Corner Rating: ***** 5-Stars

Double Indemnity plays Saturday, February 21 at 3:30 p.m. at TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX in James Quandt's amazing series "Ball of Fire: The Films of Barbara Stanwyck". The film is presented in a BRAND NEW DIGITAL RESTORATION. For further info, visit the TIFF website HERE. The film is also available on DVD and Blu-Ray via Universal Pictures replete with a phenomenal set of extra features. As well, there are many other Stanwyck films from this TIFF series which can be ordered directly below and, if so, you'll be contributing to the ongoing maintenance of The Film Corner.

"YES, I KILLED HIM. I KILLED HIM FOR MONEY AND A WOMAN.
I DIDN'T GET THE MONEY AND I DIDN'T GET THE WOMAN.
Pretty, isn't it?"

In Canada - BUY Double Indemnity HERE, eh!

In Canada - BUY Barbara Stanwyck Movies HERE, eh!


In USA and the rest of the WORLD - BUY Double Indemnity - HERE!


In USA and the rest of the WORLD - BUY Barbara Stanwyck movies - HERE!


In the UNITED KINGDOM - BUY Double Indemnity - HERE!


In the UNITED KINGDOM - BUY Barbara Stanwyck Movies - HERE!

THE UNINVITED - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Creepy ghost thriller from Hollywood's Golden Age gets the deluxe Criterion Collection treatment on a sumptuous new Blu-Ray and (if you must) DVD.

A city-dwelling brother and sister (Ray Milland and Ruth Hussey) on vacation, fall in love with a gorgeous old British countryside house overlooking the sea. Pooling their finances together, they buy the house from a nearby landowner (Donald Crisp) who sells against the wishes of his granddaughter (Gail Russell) who, as it turns out, was born in the house. Once the siblings move in, they discover it's haunted. Really haunted. It harbours several tragic secrets and not one, but two ghosts. The intrepid couple begin a horrifying journey into the very soul of this diseased domicile to discover the truth and hopefully exorcise the thing that possesses it.

GAIL RUSSELL - Tragic Unsung Talent

The Uninvited (1944) *****
Dir. Lewis Allen
Starring: Ray Milland, Ruth Hussey, Gail Russell,
Donald Crisp, Cornelia Otis Skinner

Review By Greg Klymkiw

During the very tail end of cinema's first half-century point, no major Hollywood studio production featured a genuine supernatural ectoplasmic phenomenon until Paramount Pictures unleashed director Lewis Allen's The Uninvited in 1944. Previous films utilizing ghosts presented them within the context of chicanery at the hands of corrupt sideshow-style mediums or as faked incidents to inflict madness, confusion or scams upon certain characters or simply real (or imagined) entities in comedies with macabre settings. Based upon a novel by Dorothy Macaradle, Allen's haunting picture is indeed a haunting yarn of a bonafide haunting within the walls of a truly haunted house. "Haunt" is the key word here.

Though decades have passed since the picture was unleashed (and how, in recent years, shocks and special effects have gone completely over the top), the movie still has the power to give an audience considerable gooseflesh and does so with a stately dignity and mutedly, shuddering horror.

What strikes the viewer at the beginning of the film, is that the two house-owners-to-be have been enjoying a gorgeous, sun-drenched day and whilst still in the thick of a far-from-nocturnal romp, they enter the beautiful old house that is as benign in its interior as it is out-of-doors. It's a bit dusty and un-lived-in to be sure, but warm light beams through every window and casts a lovely glow over all the usual nooks and crannies that normally (in such pictures) are dark with portent.

The other thing that hits us in the early going is that this is going to be a movie imbued with a genial sense of humour - not tongue-in-cheek, by any means, but rooted firmly in character, action, situation and narrative. The twosome are clearly urbane and witty - tossing off nicely-timed quips in each others' direction - and their entire discovery of the house occurs after their teensy idiot white dog goes tearing after a squirrel and disappears into the home's interior. The fact that the bantering brother and sister don't merely retrieve the dog, but use it as an excuse to snoop around is also amusingly light-hearted (and a telling touch in terms of character).

The element of natural comedy also comes into play with the romantic subplot involving Ray Milland's attraction to Donald Crisp's granddaughter. It's not quite a meet-cute, but upon her first appearance, the stunningly radiant Gail Russell does everything in her power to dissuade the couple from seriously pursuing their interest in the house. (Russell, by the way, was a lovely actress, but suffered from alcoholism that limited her participation in films and eventually killed her tragically at the age of 36. She remains still, a great unsung talent.)

Russell's combination of vulnerability and camera-loving sex appeal hints very strongly at the wonderful performances she would deliver in subsequent movies - albeit too few and far between. The character's sense of "unfinished business" with both the house and the mother she really can't remember pervades much of the latter half of the film and a great deal of why we do care is rooted in the delicate performance of this young actress who was barely out of her teens when she made the film. One of the more disturbing subplots to which Russell handily acquits herself is when her grandfather packs her off into the clutches of an especially diabolical psychotherapist (played with reptilian flourish by the great Cornelia Otis Skinner).

The relationship that does eventually blossom between Milland and Russell, however, is extremely fun and genial, though always tempered by the young lady's obsession with the house and her long-dead Mother. That we get a very funny sea-sickness sequence as Milland attempts to seduce the fetching young lady that's bizarrely buffered by some clearly disturbing events is for me, and always has been, one of the things I loved about the movie.

There's very little here that feels by rote. Perhaps so much of it can be attributed to the movie being the first of its kind, but I also feel that Lewis Allen's direction is sharply intelligent. It's an early work in his career - a first feature after a couple of documentary/propaganda shorts - and one senses a youthful exuberance in his play with the medium. As well, there's no denying that when the film delivers up the scares, Allen plunges us into a kind of overdrive in the sinister department.

Oddly, Allen never really attained the artistic success his work here might otherwise predict. His followup was an entertaining, but inferior thriller from the same studio the following year (1945's The Unseen) and of the fifteen or so features he delivered, his only real exceptional work was Suddenly. The latter title is especially well-directed by Allen from an excellent Richard Sale screenplay that rather unpleasantly foreshadowed the Kennedy assassination and, in fact, offers a super-scary parallel to Lee Harvey Oswald in fedora-adorned star Frank Sinatra's performance as a would-be presidential assassin. The bulk of Allen's career was spent in the early days of television as a camera jockeying director on some of the better genre series (Perry Mason, The Rifleman, Gunsmoke, The F.B.I.). That said, two exceptional features and a wealth of tersely enjoyable T.V. dramas is a pretty decent output.

If anyone doubts Allen's direction in The Uninvited, though, one needs only to experience the various scenes involving requisite bumps in the night, sickeningly urgent footsteps padding amongst the halls and the utterly horrendous moans and wails of a voice belonging to a woman cannot be located. If anything is amiss in the film, it might be the odd screenplay which includes back-story elements that seem far less interesting (and even a tad convoluted) to us than the visceral scares. God knows, however, that most contemporary films even more clumsily bear this flaw. The Uninvited is clearly, in most ways, well ahead of its time.

Finally, this is a movie all about creeping us out against the backdrop of psychological turmoil mixed with uncanny metaphysical gymnastics and after so many years, it has any number of moments that continue to deliver the goods and to reiterate, ever-so emphatically, Lewis Allen's direction seldom disappoints. The actual physical appearances of the ghosts (which are admittedly pretty fleeting, though aptly grotesque and very nicely rendered by good, old fashioned optical effects), were not even part of Allen's mise-en-scene and had to be added at the studio's insistence (rightly). In spite of this, though, one needs only recall how the film's director approaches the very first entrance into a top-floor artist studio in the old house that's been mysteriously locked. Sun blazes into the room and yet we, along with the characters cannot help but feel the chill in the air and the shudders created by the huge windows overlooking the rolling grounds, steep cliffs and roiling waters of the open sea.

Oh, how the sea beckons. So strangely and beautifully.

And murderously.

"The Unseen" is available on a newly restored Blu-Ray transfer from the Criterion Collection. There is, for those who love cinema, and particularly classic genre cinema, absolutely no reason NOT to add this package to their permanent movie collection. The disc has any number of nice supplements: A 2K digital film restoration, with a wonderful uncompressed monaural soundtrack, an interesting but strangely critical visual essay by filmmaker Michael Almereyda, the requisite trailer and booklet, plus the always delightful late night aural treats of a radio adaptations - though in this case featuring not one, but two different broadcasts from 1944 and 1949, both starring Ray Milland. The movie is also available on DVD, but why you wouldn't own a Blu-Ray player and HD monitor is beyond me.

Jean Grémillon Box joins Greg Klymkiw's 10 Best Blu-Ray and DVD Releases of 2012 - There will be one new posting everyday until we hit the magic number. Today's Klymkiw Blu-Ray/DVD Accolade for 2012 is the Criterion Collection's (Eclipse Series 34) DVD box-set of "Jean Grémillon During The Occupation"

The Best Blu-Ray and DVD Releases
of 2012 as decreed by Greg Klymkiw
This was a stellar year for Blu-Ray and DVD collectors that it's been difficult to whittle my personal favourites down to a mere 10 releases. So hang on to your hats as I'll be presenting a personal favourite release from 2012 EACH and EVERY single day that will comprise my Top 10. At the end of all the daily postings, I'll combine the whole kit and kaboodle into one mega-post with all titles listed ALPHABETICALLY. My criteria for inclusion is/was thus: 1. The movie (or movies). How much do I love it/them? 2. How much do I love owning this product? 3. How many times will I re-watch it? 4. Is the overall physical packaging to my liking? 5. Do I like the picture and sound? There was one more item I used to assess the material. For me it was the last and LEAST area of consideration - one that probably surprise most, but frankly, has seldom been something I care that much about. For me, unless supplements really knock me on my butt, their inclusion is not that big of a deal. That said, I always go though supplements with a fine tooth comb and beyond any personal pleasure they deliver (or lack thereof), I do consider the educational value of such supplements for those studying film and/or those who might benefit from them in some fashion (film students or not). So, without further ado, here goes.

Greg Klymkiw's 10 Best Blu-Ray & DVD Releases of 2012 (and to be compiled in alphabetical order in one final mega-post). Today's Title (more to follow on subsequent days) is none other than: 

Today's entry in the Greg Klymkiw list of 10 Best Blu-Ray/DVD Releases of 2012 is from the Criterion Collection's outstanding Eclipse Series; an amazing 3-movie DVD box set entitled "Jean Grémillon During The Occupation".

Eclipse is a frills-free and affordable series of great and often obscure and/or unfairly forgotten works representing the highest degree of cinematic achievement. Though lacking the almost insane degree of added value materials one finds on many Criterion releases, the true frills are the movies themselves. 

The films in the box include the following:

"Remorques", a mad melodrama set against the exciting backdrop of those companies that specialized in traversing dangerous waters to rescue (and salvage) ships in peril.

"Lumière d’été", an even nuttier melodrama involving a group of obsessive lovers and other strangers amidst a mountain resort.

"Le ciel est à vous", a moving love story set against the backdrop of amateur aviation.

I always love discovering new films and filmmakers from earlier periods of cinema. Almost shamefully, however, I must admit that prior to diving headlong into this Criterion Eclipse Series, I'd never laid eyes upon a single film directed by Jean Grémillon, the French auteur celebrated in this great box of DVDs devoted to work he directed during the Nazi Occupation of France.

I'd heard of Grémillon, of course, but what little I knew was the great story of how, as a young violinist in an orchestra that accompanied silent movies, he became entranced with the musicality of motion pictures, chucked his fiddle, entered the film business, cut his teeth as an editor, then became a prolific director whose career spanned over three decades. It's a great story and most cineastes are familiar with it. I, however, am glad I can now place a cinematic face to the story.

Jean Grémillon rocks bigtime and so too do these three great pictures in this magnificent Criterion Eclipse Box that is easily one of the 10 Best Blu-Ray/DVD Releases of 2012.

Without further ado, here's a blow by blow of the entire box set.

Remorques

Remorques (1941) *****
dir: Jean Grémillon
Starring: Jean Gabin, Madeleine Renaud and Michèle Morgan
Review By Greg Klymkiw

In 1941, during the Nazi Occupation of France, Three Wise Men (director Jean Grémillon, screenwriter Jacques Prévert and star Jean Gabin), all bearing precious gifts of motion picture genius, stood reverently beneath the shining star of French Cinema to deliver Remorques, a dazzling, compelling and moving movie melodrama of the highest order.


Vive le cinéma français!

Vive le cinéma de Jean Grémillon!

Vive le Criterion Collection Série Eclipse!

What a picture!

This stirring tale of brave, passionate, two-fisted men who work salvage vessels and the women who love them is replete with perfect ebbs and flows to keep us glued to our seats. The screenplay adaptation is gorgeously structured by Jacques (Les enfants du paradis) Prévert (based upon a novel by Roger Vercel, whose book Capitaine Conan was the basis for Bertrand Tavernier's strangely forgotten war film from 1996). Grémillon directs Prévert's deceptively simple script with all the panache of a genuine Master.

Ever wanting to push forward with characters we come to love almost immediately, the script and direction allow the necessary weight to both the men saving ships in peril on troubled waters, whilst troubled domestic waters on terra firma roil amongst the women who love their men, fearing widowhood every time their husbands risk their lives to save others.

Jean Gabin plays Captain André Laurent, a veteran sailor who commands his men with confidence and camaraderie. He has taken this job to remain in greater physical proximity to his wife Yvonne (Madeleine Renaud). Their love seems deep and genuine, yet Laurent is unable to acquiesce to his wife's requests that he retire from the sea permanently so they can live out their lives peacefully and in a state of complete devotion to one another.

Gabin, probably France's biggest star and greatest screen actor is, as per usual, utterly fabulous. The first moment we see him on screen, it's apparent some form of doom is going to befall the guy. (This is not a spoiler - if you see enough Jean Gabin movies, you know he's going to suffer some major shit storm sooner or later.)

One of his loyal crew members is celebrating marriage to a beautiful young woman. A grand speech is made by the owner of the salvage company, but it's Capt. Laurent everyone wants to hear from. Perfectly in keeping with Gabin's natural talents/personality, the good Captain modestly wishes to remain silent, but he knows he won't. Neither do his men, nor the wedding guests and frankly, neither do we, the audience. Gabin rises gracefully and reluctantly. His modesty is both heart-felt AND for show.

He's Jean Gabin, after all.

His speech sets the tone perfectly. He claims he doesn't want to make a speech, proceeds to say little beyond some stock salutations, but then, he Gabin-izes all of us with a slight twinkle in his eye and a lovely, simple comment about how speeches are not necessary in times of celebration - that what is of utmost importance is for all to dance. He then adds a thoroughly gentlemanly offer to the bride to dance with him and he receives thunderous applause.

Eventually, the celebration is interrupted. An S.O.S. signal has been received. The men storm off into the eye of the raging waters. The new bride is whisked off to spend her wedding night commiserating with the Captain's wife.

Someone might not come home. Or be maimed. But always, in their lives is Capt. Laurent - steadfast, true and a great leader. We should all have Jean Gabin lead us into the breach. For American moviegoers during this time, it was John Wayne.

France, however, had Jean Gabin.

Jesus, Gabin is unbelievable.

And yes, he's always great, but this might well be one of his best performances. It's a perfect role - replete with a sense of loyalty, duty, perseverance and a genuine love for the sea. At the same, though, he clearly loves his wife - he's mad about her. Because he's so mad about her we feel his guilt all the more. Clearly, his true love, his ultimate mistress is the sea and the camaraderie of his men. When the Captain tells his wife - with a straight face - that she need not fret about him as she did in the early years when he was away at sea for months at a time, he evokes a sense of duality that only Jean Gabin was especially capable of.

He tells her that's why he accepted a salvage commission in the first place - to be close to her. Of course, the good Captain wants to believe this. He wants to believe it so bad that he's able to fool himself into thinking he does. And yet, as he speaks these words, we sense that he ultimately understands his self-deception and worse, that he's deceiving his wife.

Yvonne is no fool. She sees through his deception whilst recognizing and almost accepting his SELF-deception. Ultimately, she wants desperately to accept his word.

These are, of course, extremely complex emotions. On the page, however, in far less skilled hands than Grémillon's, the melodramatic aspects of the story could have gone so completely wrong. The emotions could have been BIG, but simply stayed at that. This might well have resulted in solid melodrama, but here Grémillon uses the tropes of melodrama as a springboard into actions and reactions, as well as subtext, that not only take us further and deeper into the characters, but in fact, forces us - so deliciously - to root for our heroes as people, NOT archetypes.

Instead, we have a sense that yes, emotions here are running high and that the stakes - every step of the way - are HUGE. And there's not a damn thing wrong with this. (As I always say, like a broken record, melodrama in and of itself is not bad, but rather, there is only good melodrama and bad melodrama.)

Without question, Remorques is not merely good, it's GREAT melodrama.

First of all, it helps that the script by Prévert appears to chart the most perfect elements from Vercel's novel to render a screen story that is electrifyingly compelling from beat to beat. Vercel loved the sea and much preferred to set his tales against its backdrop. Strangely, though, he had virtually no experience with the sea - for him it was the pure romance of it that attracted him.

Prévert seems to understand this all too well and he also recognizes that Vercel did, in fact, have the most harrowing of experiences during World War I, which he also wrote about extensively in other books. Since Vercel favoured writing about the sea, the script is infused with this passion every step of the way - especially as it applies to the character of Capt. Laurent.

Laurent is a romantic (perhaps much like Vercel himself) and it is what makes him so damned appealing because his overwhelming degree of romance is what could also condemn him to doom and disaster.

Laurent is romantic to a fault.

And again, who better than Jean Gabin?

In the legendary "What is Cinema?", Andre Bazin writes:

"The film star is not just an actor, not even an actor particularly beloved of the public, but a hero of legend or tragedy, embodying a destiny which scenarists and directors must comply - albeit unwittingly. Otherwise the spell between the actor and his public will be broken. The variety of films in which he appears, and which seem so agreeably surprising in their novelty, should not mislead us. It is the confirmation of a destiny, profound and essential, which we unconsciously seek in the actor's renewed exploits."

It's uncanny that as you watch Remorques, how indelibly you see and feel the aforementioned Bazinian sentiments expressed above. And though expressed well over a decade after the film was long finished, released and to a certain extent "forgotten", one feels explicitly that Grémillon understood, all too well, the sense of how Gabin would infuse his role and the film itself with the "profound and essential confirmation of destiny".

Grémillon was, after all, fashioning what he hoped would be a huge hit with the biggest star in France. And yes, it WAS a huge hit. Given the political realities facing France (and the world, for that matter) at the time of the film's making, Remorques feels like a film that could ONLY have sprung from the loins of a Frenchman during the Nazi Occupation. (Though I suspect, based on the superlative direction displayed in the other films in the Criterion box set, he'd have made a great film in another age - albeit, I think, a different one.)

Gabin's Capt. Laurent represents the culmination of what Bazin termed as the embodiment of "destiny" in a character played by the likes of one who, to his adoring public, represented a "hero of legend or tragedy". Surely audiences in occupied France could not help but identify with Gabin in this role - a loyal working stiff who is loyal to that of his passion which is, ultimately, the passion of laughing in the face of danger, while at the same time, investing his love and loyalty in all the fellow working stiffs whose lives he commands, but also holds firmly in the palms of his hands.

Love presents itself to Capt. Laurent in the form of his "good" wife, but also a "bad" temptress (the character of Catherine played by Michèle Morgan) who, in one of the film's most harrowing sequences during a storm at sea, is catapulted from the raging maw of salt water to escape the abuse of her brutish, conniving husband.

The "bad" girl's hubby is indeed bad. He's not only a wife abuser, but a lazy, cowardly cheat who gets Laurent to save his ship and cargo when the going's truly tough, then cuts himself loose from Laurent once the waters settle into a calm after the storm.

Laurent risks his life (and that of his men) to save the guy and is denied any sort of salvage percentage. For his troubles, he's offered an under the table cash bribe (which he refuses) and gets instead, a temptress to lure him from his wife. Not that Laurent is especially looking for another temptress - he has the sea, after all. However, as referred to above, Gabin has some sort of doom plastered all over him right from the start and Catherine is tossed his way - unasked for. And, of course, she presents herself as one of several ways in which Laurent might choose the wrong fork in the road.

So here we are during the Occupation and Grémillon serves up a movie that must have had a HUGE metaphorical impact amongst the people of France who filled the cinemas to watch Remorques. Right under the nostrils of both the turncoat Vichy government and the Nazis, we get a movie that has, on the surface, nothing to do with the war and yet, as melodrama (and damn fine melodrama at that) gave an entire nation under the thumb of evil incarnate, an opportunity to, in Bazin's words, "reflect on the profound meaning of a mythology in which ... an actor like Gabin [allowed] millions of [Frenchmen] to rediscover themselves."

Not surprisingly, it was Grémillon himself who rejected all previous screenplays of Remorque and finally insisted upon commissioning Prévert to write the script. Who better than a screenwriter with the soul of a poet, the dramatic chops of a pro and the experience of writing FOR Gabin in previous films? Prévert turned out to be the perfect scribe to deliver a blueprint with which a great artist like Grémillon could direct a film that worked as popular cinema which, at its core was both emotional and political.

Then again, as this movie proved to me, at least, Grémillon is no slouch. (This being my first taste of Grémillon, I could hardly wait to get to the other two pictures in Criterion's Eclipse box set.) Remorques is directed with inspiring musical precision which only makes sense - Grémillon is no mere craftsman. He's an artist and filmmaker - the real thing!

The pace of the film is impeccable, as one might reasonably expect from a man who is, on one hand, a virtuoso violinist and on the other, a highly skilled editor. The movie feels like it's moving at a breakneck speed - a steaming locomotive charging crazily into the darkness. Then, before we can even sense it, Grémillon subtly changes gears and we're in a territory bordering on the elegiac.

And no matter what the pace, Grémillon handles his actors expertly - allowing their natural rhythms lots of breathing space. Their deliveries are never stylized. They don't need to be. There's plenty of style and over the top material for them to slow down and play it all very straight. So many of the conversations - especially those involving Laurent and the two women in his life pulse with the stuff of life itself. They're wildly romantic, tender and/or passionate, but almost always naturalistic.

Remorques translates into English as "Stormy Waters" and in every respect Grémillon delivers a most tempestuous tale and one for the ages at that. Astoundingly this uncompromisingly moving experience does not offer an easy way out for either its main character nor the audience. Grémillon serves up a leading man who gives us, much as this film gave French audiences under the Nazis, an utterly devastating conclusion which, in any historical context is as gut-wrenching as it is wildly, irrepressibly satisfying. That Grémillon delivers it with the greatest French actor of his time is mighty rich frosting. As Bazin said: "The public that swallows many affronts would undoubtedly feel that they were being taken for a ride if screenwriters presented them with a happy ending for Jean Gabin."

Movies, like life, do not need, as Bazin offers, "to tack on artificial finales", but rather, when artists present the unfettered romance of a man suffering for both his passion and ideals, like so many do in times of deadly strife, is far more satisfying. Pictures like Remorques can infuse one with a greater satisfaction than all the false "feel-good" tropes foisted upon us like so much trash heaped into a stinking landfill.

Bring on all the suffering and pain as you like, but for Christ's sake, do it with style and a purity of commitment that rivals, if not trumps, the supposed purity of a virgin protecting her most precious hymen.

The waters are indeed stormy.

Life and the movies are all the better for it.

Lumière d’été 

Lumière d’été (1943) *****
dir. Jean Grémillon
Starring: Madeleine Renaud, Pierre Brasseur, Madeleine Robinson, Paul Bernard, Georges Marchal, Marcel Lévesque, Raymond Aimos, Léonce Corne, Charles Blavette, Jeanne Marken, Henri Pons, Gérard Lecomte

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Jean Grémillon is a revelation. Anyone who cares about moving pictures (and loves the medium as much, if not more than life itself) will want to discover this mad genius who is clearly as important to French cinema (and the art of movies) as Jean Renoir.

Lumière d’été is yet another great picture Grémillon made during the Nazi Occupation of France during World War II and, like so many French pictures, concerns itself with those damnably, eternally and irrepressibly entertaining affaires de cœur.

Though repressed and vilified by the notorious collaborationist Vichy government, the movie seems less a criticism (and if so, submerged) than a representational view of a time and place that might only exist under such a turncoat regime. In a sense, and most fascinatingly, the film's critical eye upon Vichy might be seen to be as blatant as it is submerged.

The setting is a remote hotel high in the mountains - gorgeously designed with expansive picture windows to provide both a great view and watchful eyes upon the valley below. Bearing the name L'Ange Gardien (The Guardian Angel), it overlooks the intrusive activities of a demolition company that is in the process of constructing a dam - destroying the valley's natural beauty and assaulting the eardrums of all its inhabitants.

These intruders work with the full support of the "establishment" and in so doing, at least within narrative terms, it's not a stretch to think that Grémillon and his screenwriters, including the legendary Jacques (Les Enfants du paradis) Prévert, were pointing a finger, at least metaphorically, upon the Vichy and by extension, the Nazis. This seems likely since the movie includes, very early on and throughout, the war-like explosions coming from the seemingly endless rock blasting.

As such, Grémillon achieves the seemingly impossible. He serves up a piping hot platter of delectable cinematic comestibles that condemn, expose and/or, depending how you choose to take it, examine the strange world wrought under the Vichy whilst providing the double-scoop indulgence of luxuriating in its own sumptuous, glorious and thoroughly compelling melodrama. We, of course, luxuriate with it. Grémillon and his collaborators in front and behind of the camera work overtime to deliver a movie so infused with emotional resonance that one is hit with scene after scene that will inspire several torrential downpours from one's tear ducts.

Blending high-stakes emotions that are as truthful as they are extreme, Grémillon dapples his multi-bi-polar world with many surprising moments of deep, delicious and decidedly dark humour. Commenting hilariously at every turn of the action that unfolds - not to mention almost every line of consequence uttered by the hotel guests and/or in retort to the duties he's ordered to perform, the crotchety old servant Monsieur Louis (Marcel Levésque) wanders in and out of the proceedings like some one-man, one-line Greek Chorus. Levésque, for those who care (as should ALL!), is that he's the inveterate scenery-chewer who was immortalized by Louis Feuillade as Mazamette in Les vampires, his great 1916 serial.

He's such a great presence here. In fact, it doesn't take long for Monsieur Louis to eventually becomes a kind of "What the fuck!?" surrogate for us, the audience. Believe me, it comes in mighty handy - especially since the romantic entanglements, jealousies, anger, repression and nutty obsessions that roil madly during this one fateful weekend at the L'Ange Gardien mount with every passing scene.

The hotel is run by the middle-aged beauty Cri-Cri (Madeleine Renaud) who holds a torch for her rakish rich lover Patrice (Paul Bernard) who, in turn, develops un unhealthy obsession with the beautiful, young Michèle (Madeleine Robinson) who shows up at the hotel to meet her untalented alcoholic artist boyfriend Roland (Pierre Brasseur) who is more interested in where his next drink is coming from and drives the young beauty into the arms of the jaw-droppingly hunky miner Julien (Georges Marchal).

What we get is no mere doomed ménage à trois as might be expected from a tale involving affairs of the heart, but rather, a magnificent roundelay of obsessional love that, for lack of a better term, is best viewed as a ménage de l'abondance.

Here's the roadmap of love and regret:

Cri-Cri loves Patrice. Patrice murdered his ex-wife out of love for Cri-Cri. Cri-Cri gave up a promising and exciting career to disappear into the mountains with Patrice. Years pass. Neither is getting any younger and yet, marriage is not even a dim hope.

Michèle is devoted to Roland, but he's a major fuck-up. Patrice has his eye on Michèle. This makes Cri-Cri jealous. It also disturbs Roland. More importantly, Michèle has her eye on Julien and he's jealous of both Patrice and Roland. Patrice, in turn, is jealous of Julien. Roland, ultimately is happiest when he's pissed out of his skull.

And then there's the eternal watcher Monsieur Louis. His response to everything is a deadpan: "Why not?"

Why not, indeed!

Slowly, but surely, all the mad passions collide during an insanely opulent costume ball that Patrice throws at his mansion. Egos collide with all the requisite Grémillon aplomb and here, his kino eye renders some of the most gorgeous, sumptuously malevolent and romantic imagery in all of cinema.

And as if this wasn't enough, crazed conga lines, a drunken Hamlet, a desperate Ophelia, a stalwart stud, a woman scorned and a creaky, spindly, old William Tell with an apple on his head all become unwitting targets of a madman (mad with love and jealousy, of course). In no time at all, Lumière d’été careens wildly from a Cinderella ball on acid to a terrifying drunken drive along the mountain highways and finally, to a mad climax involving unexpected gunplay and disaster in the air on a cable car suspended precariously above the valley.

At times, you simply won't believe your eyes.

And this, my friends, is cinema!

Le ciel est à vous

Le ciel est à vous (1944) *****
dir. Jean Grémillon
Starring: Madeleine Renaud, Charles Vanel

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Le ciel est à vous is one of the great love stories in all of cinema history. It focuses on the love between a man and a woman (or in the parlance of Gallic romantics, un homme et une femme), their mutual love of aviation and their desire to pursue the freedom of the Heavens.

Pierre and Thérèse Gauthier (Charles Vanel and Madeleine Renaud, both radiant in their roles) are still madly in love after many years of marriage. When their home and business (a car repair shop) is expropriated to make way for a small airport, hangar and landing strip, the family moves to the centre of town and welcomes this otherwise inconvenient intrusion upon their lives as a sign that the 20th Century has finally arrived in their provincial hamlet. Pierre's skills and knowledge of engines eventually extend to assisting local aviators with mechanical problems they occasionally run into.

Though this is a film made (and set) in France during the 1940s under the Nazis and Vichy government, there are several universal elements inherent in Charles Spaak's screenplay that pretty much any couples will relate to on a universal level. Men, in such equations, are generally those who become collectors, pack-rats and/or obsessives whilst women are often more practical and family-oriented. The Gauthiers' fit this bill quite comfortably.

Pierre becomes so obsessed with flying that he begins exchanging his mechanical prowess for flying lessons and, eventually, earns his wings. Alas, when Pierre is injured, Thérèse makes him promise never to fly again - for fear that he'll suffer a worse fate. He agrees.

Boys, however, will be boys. He eventually sneaks off to fly again. Thérèse is, at first, in a rage, but in order to understand why her husband keeps risking his life, she too jumps in a plane.

The bug of aviation proves infectious. Husband and wife - soul mates to the end - infuse their loving marriage with a new passion. Their mutual love for aviation is, however, fraught with danger - a very real danger which seeks to end their love in this world forever. Most of all, though, the movie is populist cinema of the highest order, but blessed with a surprisingly original narrative.

Le ciel est à vous is a buoyant, funny, touching and compelling romance. Missing are Grémillon's usual perverse touches and melodrama, but they're happily replaced and enhanced with his sense of both romance and humanity. It is quite impossible to leave the tale at any moment and by the end, one desperately wants more. This is a good thing.

Amusingly, Grémillon seems all too aware that the film's political and historical contexts might well be stronger and sharper than ever. The movie not only appealed to the Nazis and Vichy government (for, as per usual, all the wrong reasons), while in reality, delivered another of Grémillon's clever, slightly submerged series of swipes at France's conquerors and traitors.

The result was one of France's hugest boxoffice successes, but even better, a movie that lived forever - well beyond its ephemeral qualities to deliver a love story for the ages: told with intelligence, sophistication and considerable political, historical and sociological importance.

I'm actually shocked this story has never been sought out by Hollywood to be remade. It's a great story and has numerous casting opportunities for contemporary stars. It really seems like a natural. Then again, since most executives can barely read, the notion of them having to read subtitles and worse, see a movie in standard frame black and white, means that we and the late, great Monsiuer Grémillon are safe from what would no doubt be an utter abomination.

"Le ciel est à vous" is available on DVD via the stunning three-disc Criterion Collection "Eclipse Series 34: Jean Grémillon During The Occupation".

ALFRED HITCHCOCK'S "BON VOYAGE" and "AVENTURE MALGACHE" - Review By Greg Klymkiw - KLYMKIW CHRISTMAS GIFT IDEA 2012 #13, Two Lost Hitchock Films from Milestone Film & Video (Milestone Cinematheque)

Milestone Film and Video presents two "lost" Hitchcock propaganda films made in Britain during World War II 

In this continuing series devoted to reviewing motion pictures ideal for this season of celebration and gift giving, here is KLYMKIW CHRISTMAS GIFT IDEA 2012 #13: A tremendous DVD for Hitchcock enthusiasts from Milestone Film and Video under their "Milestone Cinematheque" label - Alfred Hitchock's "Bon Voyage" and , , ,

 

"Aventure Malgache",

. . . two short propaganda films by Hitchcock never widely shown and sealed in Top Secret files of the British War Department since 1944.

In 1994 when Milestone co-founder Dennis Doros urged the the British Film Institute to rescue the works from oblivion these two curious and important works in Hitchcock's canon were finally made available to the world. 

Alfred Hitchcock's "Bon Voyage" & "Aventure Malgache"
dir. Alfred Hitchcock (1944) ****
Starring: John Blythe, The Molière Players

Review By Greg Klymkiw

On more than one occasion, Alfred Hitchcock was quoted as saying that "spying is a dirty business" and so it is - in both life and the movies. Hitchcock was so obsessed with the duplicity and furthermore, duplicities upon duplicities upon duplicities (and then some) of espionage activities, that many of his most suspenseful works deal with this dark world of lying and deception.

Most major filmmakers on both sides of the pond separating UK and USA were called into the active duty of creating propaganda films and assist in the war effort against the Nazis. It stood to reason that the Master of Suspense would also be enlisted in this worthwhile cause. He was, of course, but as his mission was to create two short dramatic works extolling the brave virtues of the French Resistance in their underground war against both the turncoat Vichy government and the Nazis during the occupation of France, nobody quite reckoned upon the force of genius that would never be capable of rendering straightforward propaganda.

What interested Hitchcock most were:

(i) the conflicting ideals within the Resistance movement;
(ii) human nature, its malleability under extreme stress & most of all;
(iii) the disturbing and controversial reality that so much of the espionage within the underground movement (and espionage period) was based upon a myriad of individual points of view - many of which did not always have first-person interpretations of the events, but even when they did, they were tempered by personal perspectives and assumptions.

These are things that should interest anyone on both dramatic levels and frankly in terms of presenting some reasonable cinematic approximation of what actually was going on in this strange situation when so many countries, beleaguered as they were by Nazi occupation forces, set up home bases in the UK and operated with fluctuating British interest levels in said resistance activities.

Hitchcock's real goals had almost nothing to do with propaganda. He admitted to giving it the old college try, but also acknowledged that he failed as a straightforward propagandist. Where he excelled with both films was in creating dazzling suspense, dark expressionistic moods and tales replete with considerable food for thought due to his attention to the notion of perspective.

Bon Voyage is a nail bitingly thrilling adventure that involves a young Scottish operative in France who rescues a Polish freedom fighter wanted by the Nazis. The story of escape from a world of backstabbing and betrayal is brilliantly told in flashback by the young Scotsman. Safely in Britain he delivers his verbal report of the danger-at-every-turn escape mission. The tale he tells his superiors involves sneaking about at night with his Polish charge and depending upon one complex piece of a resistance puzzle after another to eventually escape the clutches of the Vichy and Gestapo.

It's a thrilling tale with even a dash of potential romance. At the mid point of the film, however, something is thrown into the mix that creates a mystery far more duplicitous and perilous. An item the Scotsman's filed away as a personal matter turns into the key to unlock a far more insidious series of events that threaten the security of both England and the resistance movement.

As rendered by Hitchcock, the whole mystery becomes even more suspenseful as we're presented with a second and perhaps even third-hand recounting of what the young Scotsman's gone through - one that completely negates his story and suggests activities revealing a far more fragile, unstable architecture to the whole resistance movement.

Hardly the stuff of "acceptable" propaganda, though it's a lot more intriguing and thought provoking than if it had been.

The movie also features a couple of moments of unexpectedly brutal violence that not only render the tale topsy-turvy, but also fall in line with another oft-quoted Hitchcock belief that: "It is extremely difficult to kill someone." No matter what age or circumstances Hitchcock made his films in, he understood, perhaps more than any other director how to render violence in both a shocking and provocative fashion. There are two "kills" in the film that are as harrowing as any in his canon.

Aventure Malgache is a wily and clever movie that was borne out of Hitchcock's own experience with the powers-that-be who were presiding over the propaganda departments of both the British government as well as the exiled French Liberationist movement. The suspense factor is a tad overshadowed here by the trick pony wrap-around involving a group of Frenchmen living in exile in England who are acting in an amateur theatre company. One of the performers is having trouble nailing down the motivation for him to adequately play his role and another actor, once a respected resistance-tied immigration lawyer on the island of Malgache, tells him a tale of betrayal and smuggling political prisoners. In flashbacks, all the liberationists and Vichy are played by the actors who are in the play.

The film is definitely dark, but it appears to have more of an accent on satire rather than suspense. Like Bon Voyage it's crisply directed and edited. The story barrels along with panache and we're given a unique view into another time and place - albeit with Hitchcock's own political perspective on the situation that makes for interesting characters, but little in the way of simple, effective propaganda.

Both short films are superbly shot by Günther Krampf with decidedly noir-like lighting and Hitchcock's trademark compositions. As well, the films are performed by uncredited actors - many of whom were not professionals and lived in exile in the UK. John Blythe, who plays the Scottish operative in Bon Voyage is the only actor with an official individual credit. The others, a completely French-speaking cast living in exile in the UK are collectively credited as The Molière Players (to keep their remaining family members in France relatively safer from Vichy and the Gestapo).

The very clever use of flashback and point of view storytelling conceits are brilliantly employed to bridge gaps over elements of the tales that might otherwise have proven too cost prohibitive. Not only do they serve this practical purpose, but place far more effective emphasis upon the characters and Hitchcock's desire to explore HOW stories are told and are affected by individual points of view.

Both of these films are historically and cinematically significant works in Hitchcock's canon and all lovers of cinema and, in particular, Hitchcock fans will derive considerable pleasure from seeing two films that were buried for 50 years.

Alfred Hitchcock's "Bon Voyage" & "Aventure Malgache" are available in a very nice DVD volume from Milestone Film and Video.

In USA and the rest of the WORLD - BUY Alfred Hitchcock Bon Voyage - HERE!

Le ciel est à vous - Review By Greg Klymkiw - Klymkiw's CHRISTMAS GIFT IDEA FOR 2012 #4 - From the Criterion Collection Eclipse Series, an exquisite 3-movie DVD Box Set: "Jean Grémillon During The Occupation"

Jean Grémillon is a revelation. Anyone who cares about moving pictures (and loves the medium as much, if not more than life itself) will want to discover this mad genius who is clearly as important to French cinema (and the art of movies) as Jean Renoir.

Here's your Greg Klymkiw Christmas Gift Suggestion #4 for 2012. From the Criterion Collection's outstanding Eclipse Series comes this amazing 3-movie DVD box set entitled "Jean Grémillon During The Occupation". Eclipse is a frills-free and affordable series of great and often obscure and/or unfairly forgotten works representing the highest degree of cinematic achievement. Though lacking the almost insane degree of added value materials one finds on many Criterion releases, the true frills are the movies themselves. Thus far, I've reviewed two of the three films on this box: "REMORQUES", a mad melodrama set against the exciting backdrop of those companies that specialized in traversing dangerous waters to rescue (and salvage) ships in peril and "Lumière d’été", an even nuttier melodrama involving a group of obsessive lovers and other strangers amidst a mountain resort. I always love discovering new films and filmmakers from earlier periods of cinema. Almost shamefully, however, I must admit that prior to diving headlong into this Criterion Eclipse Series, I'd never laid eyes upon a single film directed by Jean Grémillon, the French auteur celebrated in this great box of DVDs devoted to work he directed during the Nazi Occupation of France. I'd heard of him, of course, but what little I knew was the great story of how, as a young violinist in an orchestra that accompanied silent movies, he became entranced with the musicality of motion pictures, chucked his fiddle, entered the film business, cut his teeth as an editor, then became a prolific director whose career spanned over three decades. It's a great story and most cineastes are familiar with it. I, however, am glad I can now place a cinematic face to the story. Jean Grémillon rocks bigtime and so too does this third and final film in the Criterion Eclipse Box that I'll be reviewing.

Le ciel est à vous (1944) *****
dir. Jean Grémillon
Starring: Madeleine Renaud, Charles Vanel

Review By Greg Klymkiw

Le ciel est à vous is one of the great love stories in all of cinema history. It focuses on the love between a man and a woman (or in the parlance of Gallic romantics, un homme et une femme), their mutual love of aviation and their desire to pursue the freedom of the Heavens.

Pierre and Thérèse Gauthier (Charles Vanel and Madeleine Renaud, both radiant in their roles) are still madly in love after many years of marriage. When their home and business (a car repair shop) is expropriated to make way for a small airport, hangar and landing strip, the family moves to the centre of town and welcomes this otherwise inconvenient intrusion upon their lives as a sign that the 20th Century has finally arrived in their provincial hamlet. Pierre's skills and knowledge of engines eventually extend to assisting local aviators with mechanical problems they occasionally run into.

Though this is a film made (and set) in France during the 1940s under the Nazis and Vichy government, there are several universal elements inherent in Charles Spaak's screenplay that pretty much any couples will relate to on a universal level. Men, in such equations, are generally those who become collectors, pack-rats and/or obsessives whilst women are often more practical and family-oriented. The Gauthiers' fit this bill quite comfortably.

Pierre becomes so obsessed with flying that he begins exchanging his mechanical prowess for flying lessons and, eventually, earns his wings. Alas, when Pierre is injured, Thérèse makes him promise never to fly again - for fear that he'll suffer a worse fate. He agrees.

Boys, however, will be boys. He eventually sneaks off to fly again. Thérèse is, at first, in a rage, but in order to understand why her husband keeps risking his life, she too jumps in a plane.

The bug of aviation proves infectious. Husband and wife - soul mates to the end - infuse their loving marriage with a new passion. Their mutual love for aviation is, however, fraught with danger - a very real danger which seeks to end their love in this world forever. Most of all, though, the movie is populist cinema of the highest order, but blessed with a surprisingly original narrative.

Le ciel est à vous is a buoyant, funny, touching and compelling romance. Missing are Grémillon's usual perverse touches and melodrama, but they're happily replaced and enhanced with his sense of both romance and humanity. It is quite impossible to leave the tale at any moment and by the end, one desperately wants more. This is a good thing.

Amusingly, Grémillon seems all too aware that the film's political and historical contexts might well be stronger and sharper than ever. The movie not only appealed to the Nazis and Vichy government (for, as per usual, all the wrong reasons), while in reality, delivered another of Grémillon's clever, slightly submerged series of swipes at France's conquerors and traitors.

The result was one of France's hugest boxoffice successes, but even better, a movie that lived forever - well beyond its ephemeral qualities to deliver a love story for the ages: told with intelligence, sophistication and considerable political, historical and sociological importance.

I'm actually shocked this story has never been sought out by Hollywood to be remade. It's a great story and has numerous casting opportunities for contemporary stars. It really seems like a natural. Then again, since most executives can barely read, the notion of them having to read subtitles and worse, see a movie in standard frame black and white, means that we and the late, great Monsiuer Grémillon are safe from what would no doubt be an utter abomination.

For my reviews of the other two Grémillon films in this extraordinary Criterion Eclipse Box Set, feel free to visit HERE for "Remorques" and HERE for "Lumière d’été".