Cavalcata d'amore

Raymond Bernard 's final thirties effort ,released just before WW2,and anticipating on the future escapist film,one of the recurrent features of the Occupation days.This is a movie made up of sketches as well as a costume drama ,as was "Le miracle Des Loups" ,his silent swashbuckler of the twenties and as would be his overlooked "Le Jugement De Dieu"(1949).Michel Simon is featured in the three parts.

SEGMENT ONE:"I 'm going to be a comedian from today onwards"

in the Middle Ages....

A drama company arrives in a castle where the lord's daughter is to marry a man she has never met:as was often the case at the time,she only saw her fiancé's "picture"-"Les Visiteurs Du Soir"(1942) has a similar beginning-.The soon-to-be-husband can strike horror into the girl's heart:a half-wit who stammers and limps;Bernard was probably inspired by Von Sternberg's "Red Empress" (1934) for the ceremony of the wedding.The bride falls for one of the thespians and tries to escape from a doomed fate ...but in the castle they blow the Mort...

SEGMENT TWO:"I wish I could be the bride"

in the 19th century....

They say there's a curse on the marriages since the tragedy told in part one. Then again ,the lord of the manor's daughter is to marry a(handsome,this time)man;a little dressmaker's apprentice,Juliette (sic) is also in love with the fiancé:one night she puts on the wedding gown and the Young man catches her when she is wearing the white garment;the curse strikes.Later screenwriter Jean Anouilh would show a girl,not blessed by nature,dancing in a ball-gown,in "Pattes Blanches" (Grémillon,1948):as though,by wearing another person's clothes ,you would become her ,an obvious female fetishism.Simone Simon ("La Bête Humaine" "cat people" ) is touching.

SEGMENT THREE :"53 bedrooms in my new home"

in the present time (1939 ,that is).....

The subject is common in the French cinema: the bourgeoisie,the Nouveaux Riches ,buy the properties of the nobles who are broke :see "Le Bal" (Thiele,1931) "Le Roi " (Colombier,1936) "Les Nouveaux Riches "(Berthomieu,1938) and the best effort of the genre "Les Affaires Sont Les Affaires "(Dréville,1942).Not only the lord short of the readies wants his son to marry a rich heiress,but he also "hires" a noble dowager as a go-between.Although immoral to a fault,several reversals of situation lead to true love ..and perhaps the end of the curse.

In 1939 ,a year when the French masterpieces abounded,"Cavalcade D'Amour " is too overlooked ;"C'est La Vie Parisienne" (Rode ,1954) is a pleasant imitation of Bernard's 1939 lovely film.

The castle is the source of legends, of the failure of love to triumph, every couple of centuries. In the first part, very noble Simone Simon is to marry the idiot son of another noble family, but falls in love with strolling player Claude Dauphin. She runs away with him. In the second installment, poor seamstress is at the castle for the wedding of very noble Claude Dauphin, but they fall in love.

It is the third installment, however, it is ignoble Corinne Luchaire, the daughter of immensely rich banker Michel Simon -- as he has been the father of Mlle Simon and M. Dauphin in the previous two episodes -- she loves only him. As he feels it necessary to have some respectable people in the family, some ancestors, he buys the castle for cash and has one of the portraits touched up to make him look like one of the family. He also hires a matchmaker. She locates Claude Dauphin, who fits the bill. His family has generals and judges, but his father is so noble, he's immensely in debt and has to cadge a hundred francs from Dauphin every Thursday, from Dauphin's monthly stipend of 1400 francs. Dauphin and father come to the castle, and he and Mlle Luchaire fall instantly in love. But she hates the thought her father will have bought him, and he hates the contempt he feels she will naturally hold him in. So they decide not to get married. Can the curse be ended?

The first two episodes are played as tragedies, but the third is a riotous comedy, with Luchaire and the two men in her life having immense chemistry. Michel Simon, as always, makes this a monstrous joy to behold.

After seeing Cat People and Curse Of The Cat People back in the '80's my daughter and I always wanted to see some of Simone Simon's pre-Hollywood work – not so easily done in those long-ago pre-internet days! I finally caught up with this, the last French film she made before going to America, and frankly can't understand why it seems to have sunk without trace, it doesn't deserve to have vanished. The print I've just seen wasn't too good but the trailer is on youtube in a decent condition – sadly "Time's dread swift passage" may not have been kind to it.

Three tragicomic tales of thwarted love from three different time periods, all centring on a particular castle and its various owners in 1639, 1839 and 1939. Michel Simon is omnipresent throughout, first as a travelling actor, then as a priest, finally as a rich capitalist – I preferred him as the latter but he looked like he had his usual fun dressing up for the first two roles. His only foible in the last was a moustache. Claude Dauphin also appears throughout the centuries as the handsome lithe young male who falls in love each time. The 1839 sequence with slinky Simone Simon left me puzzled: Dauphin was packing up to go, then does something you know he's regretting even before some bad news is given - snappy editing to be sure but what happened in between? They're all basically variations on a theme but all three stories have different outcomes, the modern perhaps not surprisingly being the most different and maybe the more interesting for that. There are plenty of worldly witticisms in the best French manner, but some of the best lines I've heard for centuries were uttered by the incredibly photogenic pair of lovers Corinne Luchaire and Dauphin in their frank all-too-human exchange in the modern castle's toyroom. Deliciously barmy! The acting was impeccable, photography and sets beautifully atmospheric, the story inconsequential but fascinating and one to savour.

There doesn't seem to be much information available on this at present but it must have been released just before the Germans marched in, so I wonder if that had anything to do with it being so neglected. The trailer states, "Une réalisation fastueuse" – a magnificent achievement, however I wouldn't disagree with that rather magnificent statement. So, a wonderful little film, admittedly probably partly because it was the first time of viewing for me but I'm hoping to be spared to watch it again a few more times in the future.