Au-delà des grilles

It's hard to know how good "The Walls of Malapaga" may or may not be, because the print I saw (which aired on TCM and which I'm assuming therefore is the best one available) is so horrible that it almost makes the film unwatchable. Most of the time the actors' faces are so washed out that you can't see them, and 50% of the subtitles are unreadable because they're in white font against frequently white backgrounds.

But the film is good for a peek at post-WWII Europe and the daily reminders of desperation and devastation from which America was largely spared. I happened to watch a couple of Susan Hayward melodramas that came out on either side of this film around the same time I watched it, and I was struck by the huge difference between what American audiences were being sold in their movies vs. what Europeans were seeing. In American films, it's like the war never happened, and the wealth and privilege is hard to stomach, whereas European films from the same time period seem to be about nothing but the war and the legacy it left behind.

"The Walls of Malapaga" received the annual Honorary Foreign Language Film Oscar that the Academy bestowed for a decade before introducing the competitive Foreign Language Film category that exists today.

Grade: B

Just watched it o0n TCM and the Janus Films copy they showed was terrible and barely watchable in HD. Someone, somewhere need to a restoration. Nonetheless, it was a good film with Gabin being Gabin, and I mean that with all the respect and accolades he deserves. But the real star performance (IMHO) is by Vera Talchi as Chechina. Sadly she has only four other films on her resume'. 8/10.

The copy of this movie that I watched on TCM was a poor one. It looked like a bad 16 mm. print; the subtitles were hard to read because they were fuzzy and the portion of the frame might have a white or black background. Given that this won the Best Foreign Picture Oscar, it seems strange that Criterion, the print's source, would be satisfied with a bad print.

The story of this French-Italian co-production is a simple one: Gabin is a fugitive from France, where he has murdered a woman. He gets off ship in Genoa because he has a toothache and has his wallet stolen, meets Isa Miranda and her daughter, Vera Talchi, and they all fall in love. Miss Talchi is a fugitive herself, from Marseilles. Her wife-beating husband has just gotten out of jail and wants his punching bag back.

In broad, this movie could have turned out like one of the movies Gabin had made with Duvivier back in the 1930s, full of Poetic Realism. Now, however, the Second World War has destroyed the world,and there is no poetry left, just bombed-out buildings for people to live in, and dentists who pull your teeth for 450 lire -- 800 if you want anesthesia. Director Rene Clement and DP Louis Page give us a tired, ugly world where people are hungry for a little kindness, simply because it has grown so rare. It's a great movie and I hope someone locates and makes available a good copy before it is forgotten.

Jean Gabin in a typical role of his, is a stowaway on a ship arriving in Genoa, a Frenchman on the run from what appears to have been a terrible crime, but in old Genoa he meets Isa Miranda who works in a trattoria and takes care of him out of pity, but gradually she falls in love with him. She has a daughter, and they are persecuted by her former husband. There is a typical noir love drama in the bombed ruins of Genoa with only one possible outcome, but at least there are some dreams allowed on the way. Her daughter plays an important part through the whole film and at times appears as the lead indeed, but Isa Miranda is the one you will remember for her beauty and excellent acting. You can always rely on Jean Gabin, he is always the same, but most striking of all are the sets among the old harbour quarters of Genoa with its ruins. It reminds you of "The Third Man" and other post war films like that with very emotional moods throughout, and this film could hardly have been made more beautiful in its neorealistic strictness. You will love it from beginning to end, and when the end comes it will not be a surprise, but like Isa Miranda and her daughter and Jean Gabin himself you will just accept it as something of a naturally fallen curtain.

A criminal, played by Jean Gabin is on the run, and no spoilers but he gets stranded in Italy, in Genoa which is still coming to terms with the aftermath of the war. Rene Clement who had not yet directed ' Les Jeux Interdit ' arguably his masterpiece, with ' Le Mura di Malapaga ' which uses both the Italian language and the French language. Visually it is stunning and full of people coming to terms with the inevitable desolation around them. He meets Isa Miranda, an abused wife, and a relationship begins. Their struggle to attain happiness in the ruins around them is the core of the film, and although I do not count this as particularly Neo-Realist or Film Noir it is ultimately a dark vision of life set in dark times. Isa Miranda stands out as being one of Italy's finest actors and gives a performance which will linger in my mind for a long while. There is one superlative scene where she is bought a glamorous dress that is deeply moving, because probably this is one of the few times in her life that she looks and feels literally transformed by happiness. I am not so happy about Jean Gabin as I feel he going through the acting motions, having played fairly similar fatalistic parts before, and does not quite inhabit his role as Isa Miranda does. A very good film, and well worth seeking out.