Synopsis:
Henri Danglard, proprietor of the fashionable (but bankrupt) cafe ‘Le Paravent Chinois’ featuring his mistress, belly dancer Lola, goes slumming in Montmarte (circa 1890) where the then-old-fashioned cancan is still danced. There, he conceives the idea of reviving the cancan as the feature of a new, more popular establishment…and meets Nini, a laundress and natural dancer, whom he hopes to star in his new show. But a tangled maze of jealousies intervenes…Read More »
Masters of Cinema wrote:
Financed by Marcel Pagnol’s production company, Jean Renoir’s Toni is a landmark in French filmmaking. Based on a police dossier concerning a provincial crime of passion, it was lensed by Claude Renoir on location (unusually for the time) in the small town of Les Martigues where the actual events occurred. The use of directly-recorded sound, authentic patois, lack of make-up, a large ensemble cast of local citizens in supporting roles, and Renoir’s steadfast desire to avoid melodrama lead to Toni often being labeled “the first ‘neorealist’ film”. Renoir himself disagreed. Although Toni is acknowledged as a masterly forerunner of neo-realist preoccupations and techniques he wrote: “I do not think that is quite correct. The Italian films are magnificent dramatic productions, whereas in Toni I was at pains to avoid the dramatic.”Read More »
IMDb:
This isn’t really a Jean Renoir-originated film. It was commissioned by a historical society to commemorate 500 years of history in whichever French city it was that this was made. Portions of the film are apparently lost, and what I saw was a three-reel reconstruction made much later, probably by the BBC. It runs about 30 minutes. It kind of tells a complete story.Read More »
IMDb review:
Sandwiched between “Boudu Sauvé des Eaux” and “Madame Bovary” ,”Chotard et Cie” is necessarily a let-down .Adapted from a stage play,it’s a badly constructed movie.Roughly there are three parts and the connection between them is very thin.
ACT ONE: Chotard (Charpin) is in the grocery business.After a ball,his daughter marries a poet ,much to her father’s annoyance.The son-in-law is no good at anything,not even weighing ham, and giving sweets for free to the children in the neighborhood.Read More »
Synopsis
On a streamer bound for Algeria, Pierre Hofer meets and is enchanted by the beautiful Claudie Duvernet, who is travelling to Algeria to collect her vast inheritance. Claudie is being pursued by some unscrupulous relatives, including the cruel Manuel, who intend to rob her of her new-found fortune. Fortunately, Pierre is on hand to thwart their schemes…Read More »
Plot (from Allmovie):
La Nuit du Carrefour (A Night at the Crossroads) may well be the least known of Jean Renoir’s sound films. Adapted from a novel by Georges Simenon, the story concentrates on a gang of thieves who utilize a cross-road garage as the hideaway. During their last caper, the gang has accidentally murdered a jewel thief, and the heat is on. Winna Winifred, the beautiful ringleader of the gang, makes the fatal mistake of falling in love with Pierre Renoir (the director’s brother), the detective who’s been assigned to bring her in. The only one of Renoir’s productions to thoroughly qualify as a “crime picture,” La Nuit du Carrefour was often dismissed by the director, who felt that he was so successful in creating a “mysterious atmosphere” that no one understood what was going on (He did, however, enjoy working with Georges Simenon, who became a lifelong friend).-Read More »