Are we being served? Au Bonheur des Dames (1930), Stephen Horne, Kennington Bioscope

Every so often you just get blown away and tonight, even after so much recent film, Julien Duvivier’s final silent film coupled with Stephen Horne’s multi-tasked and richly varied accompaniment, duly removed our socks and deposited them somewhere near the Oval.

Au Bonheur des Dames looks and feels like total silent film incorporating so many techniques of mature silent film – German camera mobility, Russian montage, Hollywood crowds and French tracking shots - all making the most of an excellent cast. The film was selected as one of Kevin Brownlow’s Top Ten in his recent audience at the Cinema Museum and here it was for us to see just why, even Kevin – especially Kevin – was impressed.

Émile Zola’s novel was published in 1883 and here it is updated to the 1920s and based at the Galleries Lafayette which was being expanded at the time before the global crash put paid to the grand designs (the façade of the Samaritaine is also used). The building is still there today, and still spectacular, a cathedral of commerce designed to offer a larger-than-life retailing experience for the aspirational elite.

A matt-painted outer shell adding to the impact plus Samaritaine which is still down the road.

Zola was naturally concerned with this growth in big business and the impact it would have on traditional family retailers and all of this was well before Walmart and Tesco… I’ve not read the book, so I can only comment on the film’s sentiments: this is done in the name of progress and unexpectedly progress is seen to win out. Then again perhaps no one expected Madame Raquin to be slowly poisoned or the lead character of L'Assommoir to waste away under the stairs… Zola wasn’t called a “realist” for nothing and a happy ending is often deceptive (as here, but hush my mouth!).

Dita Parlo (later to feature in Jean Vigo’s L’Atalante and Jean Renoir’s Le Grande Illusion) plays Denise an orphan who heads to Paris to stay with her Uncle Baudu (Armand Bour, who hangs heavy with the sense of his chracter's defeat) only to find him on his uppers as his tailoring concern is overshadowed, lierally and figuratively by the massive store, Au Bonheur des Dames (The Ladies’ Paradise) over the road.

Talk of the town

Denise arrival is full of the director’s technique as she is shown pushing through milling crowds with advertising for the store literally everywhere and getting more and more prominent, even to the point of a row of people in sandwich boards spelling out the name of this “Temple of Temptation”. You can’t avoid the oncoming story and rapid cutting and montage are used to propel Denise towards her narrative destination.

He cousin Genevieve is played by the spellbinding Nadia Sibirskaya who look slight and wan next to the hale and hearty Parlo, electric blue eyes already indicating a sadness, specifically in her partner Colomban (Fabien Haziza) – is this a world where only the strongest will survive?

Armand Bour wearing a face he keeps in a jar by the door

Denise decides that if you can’t beat them you might as well work for them and starts life amongst the mannequins who are often mistreated by Chief of Staff Sébastien Jouve (Fernand Mailly) as well as alpha female Clara (Ginette Maddie) who only has to wink at Jouve to make him do her bidding.

Clara engineers a fight that almost see Denise out on her ear, but she’s caught the eye of the store owner Octave Mouret (Pierre de Guingand) – a character with form in previous episodes of Zola’s Rougon-Macquart series and here a kind of softer-hearted womanising, capitalist.

Dita Parlo and Andrée Brabant

Mouret’s lady friend Ms. Desforges is played by the stunning Germaine Rouer who I first saw in La Terre as a peasant heroine. Here she’s rather different as an aggressive defender of her hard-won position with Mouret but she can’t stop him falling for the new girl and it’s genuine too… Denise is no easy conquest.

But, as the romance develops matters get worse for Uncle Baudu as Mouret, refinanced by Baron Hardup sorry Baron Hartmann (Adolphe Candé) makes his move to expend the shop over and through the little shop across the way: he’s goaded into more competitive action by his backers and the board.

Dita Parlo and Pierre de Guingand

Naturally this drives a wedge between Mouret and Denise whilst matters turn tragic as Colomban leaves Genevieve for flighty Mary sending her into a steep decline; Sibirskaya sometimes looks so faint she might fade away.

“The future is being built on ruins…”

This is a world in which social justice is not guaranteed and the film takes a slightly ambivalent if not fully-blown ironic, view of progress. It should be required viewing for Western governments.

Throwing himself into this maelstrom of commerce and cruelty was Stephen Horne armed only with a piano, an accordion, a flute and sundry other devices out of which he crafted a stunningly cohesive improvisation that had the audience clapping their hands raw at the end. The Bioscope audience is as coolly appreciative as Ronnie Scott’s for jazz or The Globe’s for Shakespeare… it’s only silent film but we like it. A lot.

Ginette Maddie

Nadia Sibirskaya betrayed by the attractions over the road...

Germaine Rouer and untrustworthy husband played by Pierre de Guingand

On tonight’s undercard were some fascinating shorts all graced by Lillian Henley’s crafted accompaniment.

There was a trailer for Saving Brinton (2017) which is screening on 25th October at the Cinema Museum and looks unmissable in the manner of Dawson City albeit with a more conventional narrative. This was followed by the last reel of a film missed off from the Bioscope’s Train Day, called Juggernaut (1915) and directed by Ralph Ince. It depicts the build up to a rail crash and they only went and made one! It’s a spectacular which apparently cost $25,000 and comes complete with a desperate struggle to rescue survivors.

Then we had a Bobby Bumps episode, Fresh Fish (1922) which combined cartoon animation with superbly timed live action including “punk scenery” and an evil cat (is there any other kind?).

Au Bonheur des Dames was restored by Serge Bromberg of Lobster Films and released on ARTE DVD in 2008, it's now hard-to-find and could do with a Blu-ray.

Earthy… La Terre (1921)

Germaine Rouer

 “Only the earth is immortal, the mother from whom we all spring and to whom we all return.” Emile Zola

Watching the peasants harvesting the wheat in this film put me in mind of City Girl but, whereas the latter film was set in “modern” America with large-scale, semi-automated farming techniques, here is recreated the near subsistence-level practices of the 1860’s.

Men scythed the crop which was then gathered in lose bundles by the women and piled manually-high on wooden carts. There is a small horse-drawn harvester to separate the wheat from the chaff but this is dwarfed by the 20 horse-power machine in Murnau’s film. This was life on the edge with the slightest shifts in fortune potentially life-altering.

La Terre has a documentary feel and for a film of this vintage it is remarkably naturalistic as well as uncompromising… there’s no point looking for the easy resolutions of most Hollywood fare. I notice from the IMBD reviews that some have found it hard-going but for me it is engrossing: like a good book.

La Terre was filmed in 1919-20 and adapted by director André Antoine from Émile Zola’s novel, the fifteenth in the sprawling Rougon-Macquart series – which also included L’Argent trivia fans! As with many of Zola’s stories it is full of the hap-hazard cruelties of life, whilst its detailed depiction of rural existence in the Second Republic is mixed with violence and sexual frankness that caused a scandal on its publication in 1887 and – watered down in the film – still shock along with man’s routine in-humanity to man (and woman).

Germaine Rouer and René Alexandre

Antoine had an extensive background in theatre and came late to film as “a sixty-year-old beginner”. He was concerned with realism and wanted to pay due credit to Zola’s intentions.

His adaptation takes the main strands of a novel that features dozens of characters… and tries to show the link between life and the land as well as the ruinous impact of the post-revolutionary Civil Code (1804) which provided for the ostensibly equitable division of rural estates amongst farming families which led to imbalance and in-fighting.

Armand Bour

Le père Fouan (Armand Bour) is dividing his land between his family as he and his wife get too old to work the land. It is split three ways between his daughter Fanny and two sons, the wastrel Hyacinthe – also known as Jesus Christ (after his beard, not his good grace) – played by Émile Mylo and the ambitious, aggressive, Louis Buteau (Jean Hervé).

At the same time a young man arrives in the town, Jean Macquart (René Alexandre) –  a member of one of the key families from Zola’s series and featured in two later novels. He saves a young girl who has been dragged off by a skittish cow, Françoise Mouche (the extraordinary Germaine Rouer) who is Fouan’s niece. The two form an instant attraction and Françoise takes him to find work at one of the larger local farms.

La Cognette et La Trouille!

Here he meets La Cognette (Jeanne Grumbach) who effectively manages the farm. Older and more experienced than Françoise – who is under age – she also romances the handsome new arrival…

In exchange for his land Fouan’s children are to pay him a regular pension but, all too quickly, greed diverts their intentions…it’s not difficult to see the links to King Lear here although poor Fouan is badly in need of a Cordelia…

Émile Mylo

Hyacinthe is certainly the Fool but a poisonous one… He lives his life as a poacher, drinking his days into oblivion and using his daughter La Trouille – The Pest – (Berthe Bovy) to help steal anything they can.

Fanny is married to a well-to-do farmer but cannot abide her father’s diminished position whilst Buteau just wants it all and is completely un-restrained by any consideration of his fellows. He marries Françoise’s elder sister Lise (Jeanne Briey) and turns the younger girl into little more than a slave, all the while harassing her sexually.

A wicked brother-in-law

Then there is Fouan’s sister who, left out of his “living will” holds him in disgust and hopes that he will “die in a ditch”.

So far so grim – so Zola – and so it proceeds with the old man being cheated of his agreed payments as his children proceed to abuse him, refuse to pay him and force him to move around between them.

But there are still Antoine’s wonderful shots of the family working their fields, all put together with meticulous attention to detail and on glorious sunny days. There are superb close-ups of Buteau and Françoise as they rest in the hay. He tries to grab hold of her and she escapes, meeting Jean further down the field. When the camera returns Françoise has her hair down and something has clearly “gone on” with Jean, a fact he admits to a friend shortly afterwards…

Hats on

The relationship between Françoise and Jean develops in spite of the Buteau’s disapproval – he knows full well the challenge it poses to his lifestyle.  As she reaches 21 Françoise marries Jean and demands her inheritance leading to the eviction of Buteau and Elise – blood doesn’t get any badder and you know this will not be the end of the matter.

Meanwhile Fouan’s health is deteriorating and he is running out of options as one by one his family disown him.

Bad blood...

I won’t give any more of the plot away as this is a storyline well worth seeing out in your own time. I watched the Milestone DVD which features an excellently sympathetic score from the experienced composer, Adrian Johnston, who treats the story with all the respect due to a new film.

La Terre was long considered lost and this restoration, from Kevin Brownlow and David Gill, was made in collaboration with the Royal Belgian Film Archive and the Cinémathèque Française, using the sole surviving copy made available by Gosfilmofond, Moscow.

Germaine Rouer: seventy years between these shots

It also features the text from an excellent interview with Germaine Rouer conducted by Kevin Brownlow in 1991. Her memories are precious: “… he let us be natural. Sometimes he just told me: “Try to look like a peasant girl, go on, look like a peasant girl.” So I did all I could to look like a peasant girl.”

La Terre is a vibrant film from an age of experimentation: magically far closer to the era it recreates than our modern world... so far removed from the land. It is readily available direct from the Milestone site.

The further adventures of… Les Vampires (1915)

Irma Vep stows away...

When last I left Les Vampires it was roughly at the half way point, with a further twist in the already meandering plotline seeing a rival emerging to the criminal gang. Juan-José Moréno (Fernand Herrmann) is the Vampires’ equal in cunning but is perhaps less anarchistic and more purely driven by criminal greed.

Sometimes it feels as if Louis Feuillade’s ground-breaking series is being made up as he goes along  but that would hardly be unique. As the episodes pile up and the stories get longer, he succeeds in maintaining interest and in fleshing out the characters.

Satanus, Moréno and Irma plot...

The enemy keeps on  shifting as the Grand Vampire (Jean Aymé ) is despatched by Moréno only for the real head Vampire to be revealed as the aptly-named Satanus (Louis Leubas). He in turn is replaced by the chemical mastermind, Venomous (Frederik Moriss) as the Vampires prove able to re-generate themselves and the narrative.

The one constant is the presence of Irma Vep (Musidora) who is with us until the bitter end. Feuillade knew when he was on to a good thing and this prototypical femme fatale is the real heart of the criminal gang. She falls for Moreno and the two threaten a new off-shoot gang before they are captured and executed. But Irma just won’t lie down and with Satanus’ audatious help escapes from the ship taking her to confinement in Algiers and fights her way back to Paris.

I’m not sure if she was the first such “baddy” in film but she certainly was one of the earliest. She’s full of evil energy and seems totally ruthless in the pursuit of her aims, even fooling some railway staff into making a collection for her after spinning them a yarn of love betrayed.

The journalist Philippe Guérande (Édouard Mathé ) remains relentless in his own pursuit and as the story develops he and his family come under increasing threat. The Vampires are resourceful and very much the equal of the forces of good, every defeat brings another victory nearer for them.

Philippe becomes engaged to Jane (Louise Lagrange) and the Vampires plot to finish off his fiancé and poison his whole family. It’s only through good fortune that the guests are saved, albeit at the expense of the concierge’s life.

Augustine crosses Avenue Junot...

There are more superb exterior shots as the Vampires are chased across rooftops, in cars, on trains and on bikes! It remains a superb document of Paris a century past and mere miles away from the front line in the Great War.

Mazamette (Marcel Lévesque) continues to provide much light relief and his character is really fleshed out after he acquires a fortune in reward money following the arrest of an incidental fraudster. We meet his young son who is soon enlisted in helping to track down the Vampires (and armed with his own gun!). It’s quite a leap for the character who had been so easily blackmailed in the early episodes but the story is stronger for it – he’s a more engaging character than straight-ahead hero Philippe.

Augustine (Germaine Rouer) and Mazamette (Marcel Lévesque)

In the final episode, Jane, now Philppe’s wife, is kidnapped by the Vampires who also ensnare Augustine (Germaine Rouer), the concierge’s widow and Mazamette’s fancy (I lost track of where his wife had gone!). Philippe traces their car thanks to a hole Mazamette had blown in the petrol tank. He cases the joint and lowers his gun to Jane imprisoned in the cellar.

The pace really picks up as he prepares the ground for their rescue and, as the Vampires engage in an orgiastic celebration assured of their ultimate victory, the police arrive and slowly get into position…

To find out what happens I recommend you buy the box set. It’s pretty easy-going stuff and reminded me a lot of 1960’s ITC serials such as The Avengers and Department S. The criminals use gadgets – gas, portable mortar guns – they have hide-outs, diguises and are nearly always ahead of their opponents.

Mazamette thinks!

They’re also pretty good dancers and have an amoral spirit which almost makes you root for them: anti heroes don’t come much more charmingly camp than Irma Vep!

The acting is good and any over the top moments are redeemed by the tongues firmly in their cheeks: it’s not just Mazamette who has his knowing gaze to camera. This is meant to be escapist fun... it wasn't necessarily the time for serious drama.

The Vampires celebrate victory, but are they being premature...

These are the ideal films to use on the undercard before your main features and watched over time as a "series" rather than swallowed whole. I thoroughly enjoyed Les Vampires and as with all good box sets, wished there’d been one more story arc.

I watched the Artificial Eye DVD but the whole shebang is now available on Blu-Ray... tempting!