La tête contre les murs

La tête contre les murs (AKA: The Keepers/Head Against the Wall) is directed by Georges Franju and adapted to screenplay by Jean-Pierre Mocky from the book written by Herve Bazin. It stars Mocky, Pierre Brasseur, Paul Meurisse, Anouk Aimée, Charles Aznavour and Jean Galland. Music is by Maurice Jarre and cinematography by Eugen Schüfftan.

François Gérane (Mocky) is seen as a loose cannon by his father and finds himself committed to a mental asylum. Within the walls he finds two doctors who have very different ideas on how to administer psychiatric care. Struggling to keep hold of his sanity, François finds solace in a friendship with fellow patient Heurtevent (Aznavour) and the visits he receives from Stéphanie (Aimée). But will François ever get out? And if so will his sanity be intact?

Jean-Pierre Mocky had initially planned to direct the film himself, but Franju was brought in and it proved to be a superb meeting of minds. Mocky's youthful zest and grasp of the Gérane character's predicament marries up beautifully with Franju's hauntingly poetic leanings.

In core essence the narrative is about the inadequacies of psychiatric care at that period in time, with a clash of ideals between two doctors acting as the axis. The story is actually based on fact, the author of the novel, Herve Bazin, really having been sectioned by his own family. This adds a harrowing air of realism to proceedings, and with Franju firmly cloaking the film with a disquiet atmosphere, the results often feel like being part of some feverish nightmare.

This is what it sounds like when doves fly!

Technically the pic comes close to being a tour de force, the crisp black and white photography magnificently emphasising Franju's eye for off-kilter details. There's is much grim imagery on show, where weird models made by the patients and the hospital cemetery prove particularly eerie. The hospital itself is cold on the inside with chessboard flooring holding the weight of lifeless looking walls. Exterior of the building is ominous, especially at night where it's transformed into a Gothic place of secrets never to be told.

Some scenes stay embedded in the mind, for better or worse as it happens. A suicide, a violent attack, an escape attempt through a burning field, the two doctors arguing about the ethics of their beliefs in front of a cage full of beautiful doves, the reoccurring shots of the poor patients in their surroundings, or the devastating noir finale; both in visual excellence and story denouement, the film consistently arrests your attention. Jarre's musical score is eccentric in the extreme, fluctuating between being creepy, jolly, wistful or just plain weird, it's perfectly at one with the material on the page. While the cast all give quality performances, especially Aznavour. Great film making, smart, challenging and daring. 8/10

The Masters of Cinema DVD release is a beautiful restored print doing justice to Franju and Schüfftan's skills, and the 48 page booklet is most impressive. Unfortunately the extras really don't add up to much. Two videos of interviews with Mocky and Aznavour taken in 2008 add up to just over 13 minutes, with the Aznavour one only 4 minutes and hardly about the film really! The Mocky interview is excellent, some real insights into the making of the film, his thoughts on the pic's importance, and some frightening revelations during filming. But at 9 minutes in run time you can't help but be annoyed there wasn't considerably more of that interview.

If a film is hard to find and directed by an interesting director, this does not automatically make it a masterpiece. "La Tête Contre les Murs" is mostly heavy going, talky, and often tedious. The film is nicely shot in black & white, but Maurice Jarre's score adds little to the experience. A sluggishly paced film with few memorable moments.

Mocky, Brasseur and Meurisse are certainly assets to this project. Fans of Charles Aznavour can see him shortly before his great breakthrough in "Shoot the Piano Player". He is quite good here as well. Anouk Aimée is fine too, soon to make an impression in "La Dolce Vita".

"La Tête" is on DVD finally, so the curious can see for themselves. Just OK, not some great lost masterwork.

La Tete contre les Murs (Head Against the Wall) was the first feature film directed by Georges Franju. Prior to that he made a dozen shot features and documentaries most remarkable of them being his debut 1949th documentary "Blood of the Beasts". Franju is mainly known for being the co-founder in 1936 of the French Film Archive.

Originally Head Against the Wall was the dream project of Jean-Pierre Mocky, who made a screenplay adaptation of the novel by Herve Bazin and invited Franju to direct it. With Franju came the rest of the cast, namely: Pierre Brasseur, Paul Meurisse and Charles Aznavour, who proved here that he not only can sing, but act also, and how!

The main character of the film François (Jean-Pierre Mocky) is a troubled young man whose main occupation in life is motor-cross racing and whose mother had recently committed suicide. The only glimpse of light in his life is Stephanie (Anouk Aimee). Since the tragic death of his mother he finds it especially difficult to live with his despotic father Mr. Gerane. The tension between them comes too far resulting in François being sent to a Mental Hospital by his father, under a false medical report. Here we come to the second main theme of the film (the first being father-son, in fact generations conflict) which is sanity behind the insanity, sanity in the world of the insane. Entering this world François finds a friend Heurtevent (Charles Aznavour) who is like him has little to do with the place they are in. He's a kind of a very sad day-dreamer who simply wants to get free from Hospital's surroundings and constant control of a kind of a substitute for his father, it's director - Dr. Valmont (Pierre Brasseur) and peacefully live somewhere by the seaside. Together with François they are beginning to make plans to escape. 7/10