Têtes de femmes, femmes de tête

Jacques Feyder had been a film director for about a year when he turned out this, his fourteenth movie -- they turned them out a lot faster in those days.

This is a comedy of manners about women fighting over a man who is a professional escort for married women and the sort of warfare that goes on when, escorting a pair of sisters to the opera, he stops to say hello to another client. They don't like it and make their displeasure known, until he exacts his own revenge -- or tries to.

Feyder makes full use of the French style of camera-work in which the camera seems to sit there, sardonically observing people. He does a lot more editing than Gaumont's master of the style, Feuillade, does, but Feuillade was working on serials at this stage, and he could afford to let people wander in and out, especially when he was making up something to write himself out of a corner. Feyder had to make every second count, and he does; he is working in a couple of reels, and has his actors behave subtly for the period -- but they let you see that their good manners are only on the surface.

I am going to be more charitable with "Heads...and Women Who Use Them" simply because for its time, it's very well done. In 1916, films were often very short and overacted. However, this Jacques Feyder film is rather subtle and artistic--and at 36 minutes, it's a rather long movie for its day. My only misgiving is that I think it's supposed to be a domestic comedy but really is rather short on laughs.

The film begins with a woman receiving a letter from her sister. It seems the sister is worried because her husband is paying way too much attention to an Italian princess. So, the two sisters come up with a plan to keep him from roaming--convince him that if it's okay for him to stray, it's equally okay for her to do the same.

While the plan is insane (mostly because you wonder what might REALLY happen in such a situation), the film is so very well done that you can't help but admire the cast and direction. It really is made quite well. Worth seeing.