O Corcunda de Notre Dame

The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a very hard film to make. Mostly due to the darkness and despair of the original work. If you've only grown up with the Disney version, prepare to be shocked. I truly liked this effort, as it got a lot of the complexities of each character down. Frollo is a man of religion but also science. His faith and logical mind battling it out as he experiences lust. Esmerelda is a victim of her own beauty, but also plays a hand in her own downfall. She doesn't understand her power over men which leads to her angering of the males. Quasimodo is portrayed as not so much an outcast here. He is known by all, but is awkward and unaware of his strength. This is a film where everyone is guilty for their actions, which also makes them all sympathetic. The design of the film is often too much. WIth so many colors and such production put in it comes across as an over the top school production. Less can be more, but with the final heart wrenching scene, you'll probably be left as an emotional wreck.

This version of the Hugo novel is more faithful in both tone and plot than is the earlier Charles Laughton version. That said, it's not nearly as much fun.

La Lollo is quite fetching and earnest as Esmeralda and gives an effective, if slightly bosom-heaving, performance. Quinn, with his simian features accented by makeup, is a good Hunchback. He doesn't milk the role for pathos, and let's the viewer see several sides to Quasimodo. Alain Cuny is dark and brooding as Frollo, but he doesn't register as vividly as Cedric Hardwick in the earlier version.

Then there's some pretty bad acting from others in cast, but the script is pretty flat and misses some good opportunities. In the earlier version, Laughton (his double, actually) swings across the plaza, scoops up Esmeralda (the gorgeous Maureen O'Hara) and swings back into the church. Quinn just shinnies down a rope and yanks Lollo into the church. More probable, perhaps, but not so exciting.

It's a gorgeous, colorful widescreen epic, nicely served by the DVD release. It's not a sentimental movie; neither is the novel. And it's worth a kind look.

In this third version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame we get a story far closer to the truth of Victor Hugo's classic novel. Unlike the productions done starring Lon Chaney and Charles Laughton, this one was done in France by the French who took pains to remain faithful to the version Victor Hugo wrote.

Note the title in the original French and note it's the cathedral not the hunchback who is the center of the story. That allowed Italian film star Gina Lollobrigida to be billed first and then Anthony Quinn as the hunchback. No doubt about it Lollobrigida is the sexiest Esmerelda going, she makes both Patsy Ruth Miller and Maureen O'Hara look like nuns. Then again she was who the movie going public was paying to see.

This is not to take anything away from Anthony Quinn who seems to extend his role as the brutish strong man in La Strada into his portrayal of Quasimodo. Although Charles Laughton's performance is my favorite, this does not denigrate Quinn in any way.

The rest of the cast is made up of players from the French cinema. I particularly liked Jean Tissier as the 'Spider King' Louis XI. It's a subtle piece of acting and you can see why this was no man to trifle with.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a tale of innocence. Quasimodo's to be sure, but even the sexy and voluptuous Esmerelda. She may know all about sex, but she's pretty ignorant in the ways of the political world. Both protagonists are used by forces and people they cannot comprehend.

This version of the Victor Hugo classic has its supporters and they should support this great retelling of a classic tale.

'Notre Dame De Paris,' set in medieval Paris in the year 1482, tells the moving story of a beautiful gypsy dancer and a grateful hunchback who adores her...

Quinn's distinctive interpretation of the ward of the cathedral in the sumptuous, wide-screen, full-color version of the Victor Hugo successful historical novel, is full of vitality as well as pity...

Despite the spectacular appearance of Gina Lollobrigida, top-billed as Esmeralda, it is Quinn in full monster regalia who remains in the memory, not many lengths behind Lon Chaney and Charles Laughton...

The motion picture is focused on the events leading to Esmeralda's trial for witchcraft and the stabbing of her noble lover, the cavalier of King Louis XI... Esmeralda is accused of the crime, tortured and sentenced to death... When she is about to be hanged, Quasimodo pushes the hangman aside, sweeps her into his arms, and carries her into the sanctuary of Notre Dame...

Much of the rich atmosphere so vividly described in the Hugo irresistible tale - the happy Festival of the Fools, the Court of Miracles, the cathedral and its role as the center of medieval Paris, the storming of Notre Dame - provide the spectacle a timeless message of lust, jealousy, prejudice, hate, compassion and love...

Quasimodo is just 'one long, ugly face from his head to his toes,' but in his distorted body, there is lot of humanity, kindness, and gratitude... Quasimodo lives high in the church towers... We see him exceptionally agile, showing no fear for its height, climbing down its facade, embracing its huge bell, telling Esmeralda in halting words that she is safe within the walls of the cathedral... That day, Quasimodo leaps onto 'Big Louise' and rides his beloved huge bell back and forth sending its mighty sound throughout Paris for his beloved Esmeralda...

Esmeralda is the sensuous gypsy girl, who ascends the pillory to quench Quasimodo's thirst... She is fond of dancing, noise and open air... She is in love with one man whom she calls the 'bright sun.'

Master Frollo (Alain Cuny) is the man in black who inspires respect and fear... He is the haunted Archdeacon of Notre Dame, an expert on witchcraft... It is said that he is the greatest magician of all France, but magic is merely illusion... Frollo is completely taken with Esmeralda's beauty... He is the king's judge who lies about the ravishing temptress who follows him in his dreams... His thoughts are like Quasimodo's face, ugly! ('We are brothers.. your face and my soul..')

Phoebus (Jean Danet) is vain, arrogant, and opportunistic... To him, the Gypsy girl is a sexual object to be cynically manipulated, used and rejected... The only love which the Captain of the King's Archers recognizes is narcissism... His tendency to erotic self-love and his excessive self-admiration...

Robert Hirsch is the harmless poet - educated under the patronage of Master Frollo - who breaks the laws of the kingdom of thieves and beggars, and has one chance to live...

'Notre Dame De Paris' shows us that human nature always struggles between two opposing forces: The light and the darkness, the grotesque and the beautiful, love and hate, hope and despair...

In 1482, in the Feast of Fools in Paris, the deformed bell ringer Quasimodo (Anthony Quinn) is elected the King of Fools. After the party, the evil alchemist Master Claude Frollo (Alain Cuny), who has a repressed lust for the kind gypsy dancer Esmeralda (Gina Lollobrigida), orders his servant Quasimodo to abduct the beautiful youngster. However, she is rescued by Captain Phoebus (Jean Danet) and Quasimodo is sentenced to be whipped in the square of Notre Dame and Esmeralda gives water to him. Later Esmeralda goes with Captain Phoebus to a room in an inn to spend a night of love together. However, Frollo is stalking her and uses her stiletto to stab Phoebus on his back, and Esmeralda takes the blame and is sentenced to be hanged. But Quasimodo brings Esmeralda to the sanctuary of Notre Dame and expresses his love for the gypsy.

"The Hunchback of Notre Dame" is one of the cruelest romances of the literature and cinema history in a dark age in French history. In this version of this sad tale of injustice, Anthony Quinn is awesome with a memorable performance and Gina Lollobrigida is perfect in the role of the seductive gypsy. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "O Corcunda de Notre Dame" ("The Hunchback of Notre Dame")