L'abbé Constantin

An entertaining little comedy,a remake of a Julien Duvivier's silent from the twenties which seems lost forever,"l'abbé Constantin" is a minor triumph for Françoise Rosay who overshadows the rest of the cast in her portrayal of an over possessive mom, a countess whose idee fixe is to become a chatelaine again.but alas, the public sale ("A la Bougie" = with candles:it is the first time I have seen such a sale by auction in a film)is a disaster cause the beloved son cannot get the castle which 's sold for a hefty sum to ...Americans! "Those Americans,Rosay screams,they steal our properties,they drink whiskey and they are not even catholic ,you heretics!" But the new owner is a gorgeous young Bettina and the countess soon realizes that marrying her son to her would be a good idea to get the desirable mansion.But she will have the curate's nephew ,a handsome man in a navy uniform, to reckon with.

The ending is a bit daring for the time: a menage a trois is just around the corner.

It's a pleasure to see such an old black and white in the middle of the contemporary movie maelstrom. Other times, other mores, other scenery.

I had never seen Claude Dauphin and Jean Martinelli that young, neither Françoise Rosay and Pauline Carton moreover. And when one can see such times movies, in the beginning of the thirties, when this film was itself completely contemporary then, and one knows the apocalypse coming in France and Europe 6 years later, one can understand also the Frenc people surprise in front of that dark age. In 1933, there was a very strong wind of insouciance, lightness, even irresponsibility, the one of an teenager who fears nothing since he knows nothing.

Excellent interpretation. Direction is almost uncritizable since it represents a museum piece of our movie history. Dialogs are sweet and subtle, with delicious humour.

See this.