Topázio

Yes, indeed. Barrymore at his best. Charming story about a French schoolmaster who is unwittingly embroiled in a controversy that forces him to face truth, honesty and integrity outside of his classroom walls.

Barrymore and a fresh-faced Myrna Loy are the stand-outs in this engrossing part melodrama, part comedy. And I mean comedy in the most strictest, serious forms. Full of pathos and irony.

The final scenes of comeuppance and the balancing of justice have been done over and over in many movies since and probably before, but never so deliciously biting as in this simple but strong story.

Recommended without reservations.

Topaze (1933)

** (out of 4)

Extremely weird film about a nice and honest school teacher (John Barrymore) who gets fired from his job after failing a 12-year-old boy but soon gets a job but unknowingly starts ripping off the public with fake sparkling water. The majority of the film deals with the nice guy Barrymore being taken advantage of by bad people and being forced to do bad things without knowing it. That's all good and fine but I'm not sure if this was suppose to make me laugh or not. It's listed as a comedy in every guide book but not once did it make me laugh so on that level the film certainly didn't work for me. The movie kept me entertained from start to finish but all of that is due to Barrymore who delivers a terrific performance. I'm slowly going through Barrymore's filmography and I've mainly watched his wacky, over the top film but here he actually stays within the mild mannered character and doesn't resort to any of that weirdness. He is totally believable as his character and delivers something very fresh. Myrna Loy is his assistant but doesn't get much to do.

Pointy-bearded milquetoast schoolmaster is fired for his integrity and becomes an accidental titan of industry.

This is an adaptation of a French play (a pretty loose adaptation, I think) and the staginess shows. In my opinion, that can be either good or bad, and I think it works to the movie's advantage in this case. It feels like I'm watching a play, instead of watching a bungled attempt to push a play onto film. In spite of the staginess, however, the sets are very good. An extended shot of the schoolmaster in the classroom, with snow falling outside, is so effectively done that it's hard for me to stay focused on the characters, because I just want to watch the beautiful snow through the windows.

Even so, it must be admitted that the plot is rather thin here. Not a lot happens. This is strictly a John Barrymore vehicle. Even Myrna Loy isn't give a lot to do except be sweet and sympathetic. Any hint of romance between her and Barrymore is only that, the barest of hints. Albert Conti is mere bluster and a fake mole. Nevertheless, Barrymore shines and successfully carries the entire movie by himself. His flawless mastery of stage business--as a single small example, the way he removes his pince-nez--ensures that.

The ending is wickedly cynical, as indeed is the entire movie. But it seems like the movie will close on a villains-get-theirs, good-always-wins-in-the-end note. It's refreshing that this doesn't happen.

The movie clocks in at just under 90 minutes, which makes it just the right length for what is, after all, a fairly lightweight storyline.

"Topaze" is another of those quality movies from the early 1930s that showed in theaters once, and then vanished for decades. There was a laser disc release of this movie on the CBS label 60 years after "Topaze" original release in 1933, but nothing in between. TCM probably showed the movie, but I never spotted it on that cable channel's schedule. John Barrymore was at the peak of his Hollywood career when he made this movie, playing Professor Topaze, who learns the hard way that nice guys finish last. "Topaze" was just another movie on the studio production schedule, but try and find now a movie with the quality and entertainment value of "Topaze," along with commentary thrown in on the world of business.

Ben Hecht wrote that he only spent a few weeks writing the screenplay for "Topaze," considering the work just another job for hire, fast money. That attitude, take the money and run, probably applied to John Barrymore, who worked for the studio that agreed to pay his $25,000 a week salary. David O. Selznick, the movie's producer, knew that RKO Studios was in financial trouble, heading for bankruptcy, but Barrymore was one of the biggest Hollywood stars in the early 30s, worth the money. "Topaze," the end result of the work of the talent RKO brought to the screen, is part cynical take on business, part romantic comedy and all original for Hollywood. Henri d'Abbadie d'Arrast, the movie's director, does a great job of pacing this story of a school teacher thrown in the big world as a pitchman for a company selling tainted bottled water. D'Abbadie d'Arrast had no career in Hollywood after this movie flopped.

In one scene in the movie, the backers of the bottled water, thinking over who they can get to promote the water, think about hiring a famous general as their shill. Instead, they decide on a teacher named Dr. Topaze, a teacher at the school one backer's child goes to, and name their product Topaze water. Over 70 years later, advertisers still use researchers and scientists in their commercials to push their products.

Maybe D'Abbadie d'Arrast career went south after going over budget on the movie by not doing everything possible to film all of Barrymore's scenes within two weeks, as William Wyler did making a later Barrymore picture, "Counsellor at Law." Hollywood lost a top craftsman when D'Abbadie d'Arrast stopped directing movies. In "Topaze," Barrymore is great as Dr.Topaze, Myrna Loy looks great and the audience even learns something about the Punic Wars. What a class picture.

FYI: At the 42 minute mark of Topaze, John Barrymore and Myrna Loy are in a cab driving down a main thoroughfare in Paris during a rainstorm. The rear window of the cab shows the traffic behind them and, once or twice, a pedestrian behind them crossing the street in the rear projection shot. At 44 minutes, the image dissolves for a fraction of a second, whiting out, and the special effects technician replays some of the one and one half minutes of stock footage previously rear-projected. Someone at RKO made a copy of the stock footage and spliced some of this copy footage to the end of original footage to end up with the two or so minutes of rear projection footage needed for the cab scene. Clever, huh, and you would never notice it if not for that momentary glitch as the rear image whites out. All routine for Vernon Walker's RKO special effects unit. But, as usual, very well done.

Hapless schoolmaster Auguste TOPAZE becomes the dupe of a duplicitous baron attempting to sell worthless tonic water.

John Barrymore is wonderfully cast against type as the gently pedantic professor in this sadly obscure comedy from RKO. For much of the picture he dithers delightfully, well aware that often less is more in the game of cinematic scene stealing. Living his life by the simple maxims of honesty & decency, Barrymore's character is stunned when his good name is threatened by his powerful new employer. But he has a scheme...

Lovely Myrna Loy, as cool & untroubled as an icy glacier, does well by her role as the baron's levelheaded mistress. Refreshingly, the story allows only an innocent platonic friendship between herself & Barrymore. It is enough.

Aristocratic Reginald Mason gives an enjoyable performance as the crooked baron, while the massive Jobyna Howland revels in her small role as his unspeakable wife. Young Jackie Searl scores as their repellent little son.

Good assist is given by Albert Conti as a corrupt politician, Luis Alberni as an outraged chemist, and, in the same year he'd captain the steamer to Kong's Skull Island, Frank Reicher takes the role of the stern headmaster of the boy's school which employed Topaze.

Ben Hecht's script for the film was based on the original play by Marcel Pagnol.