La petite marchande d'allumettes

Although this version hits on many of the points in the original story, there is no doubt that this is director Jean Renoir's very own interpretation. He perhaps outdoes Hans Christian Andersen in conveying a harsh reality with little or no recompense. The finale is heavy laden with symbolism of which might have been some influence to Orson Welles' "Citizen Kane". Renoir himself seems to have been influenced by Andersen's "Steadfast Tin Soldier" and Victor Herbert's "Babes in Toyland(1903)". And the life size dolls remind one of Maria in "Metropolis(German, 1927)". The New Year's story should be familiar to most- one sorrowful day in the life of a poor girl, without happiness at home nor on the job. This particular adaption presents a girl much older than seen elsewhere and is set in the present. Ranks a close third behind the 1937 cartoon and the near perfect 1986 British musical film. With sound effects and music, the latter used particularly well with a rendition of Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries", which of course(to Western fans)was also used with great results in My Name Is Nobody(Italian, 1974). The video edition viewed had fair to good picture quality.

This short early silent from the French master Renoir shows a good deal of imagination on the director's part – although not in terms of casting: he once more looked no further than his then wife Catherine Hessling whom he was trying to build into a star for the lead role. Hessling is too old for the part, but at times she does manage to convey a degree of innocence required for the role, even if it does mean her performance borders on the (deliberately) comical at times. This being an adaptation of Hans Christian Anderson's tragic short story, these brief light-hearted moments are at odds with the general theme.

The second part of the film veers off into fantasy as we're treated to the girl's childlike fantasies as she slowly freezes to death. Again, there's a good deal of imagination gone into this sequence, but it does become a little repetitive after a while. The spectre of Death, initially in the form of a Jack-in-the-Box, looms over the fantasies, however, until the film climaxes with a concisely edited chase sequence on horseback.

This is a curious choice of story for Renoir, and it obviously doesn't reach the standard of his later output. However, it possesses a Gallic charm that sets it apart from most films of the era, and is worth catching simply to see a master of cinema near the beginning of his cinematic career.

La Petite Marchande D'Allumettes is another of Renoir's bleak portrayals of meek and meager lives at odds with their milieu. Something about it though feels like a re-hashing of earlier Renoir works (Une Vie and La Fille...even Nana). This piece was filmed in the Vieux-Colombier and produced by Tedesco. I conjecture (or just straight up fantasize) that the pair brainstormed on a film concept that was to be "suited" for Renoir and Hessling together. I imagine the idea of adapting a famous tale (Andersen's short story) as a compromise (never a great way to produce art imo)... and what you get is something not quite original in any way whatsoever. Now, that isn't to say that the French Impressionist film techniques used in the hallucination sequences are not constructed and crafted with technical precision and genius intuition... but that it was already fertile ground for Renoir (and Hessling for that matter). I have previously hypothesized that some of Renoir's silent work was prophecy and prognostication through forming a death allegory between human freedom and the film industry itself. This may have been the last time that Renoir favored a stylistic system constructed around a protagonist's psychology and showcasing avant-garde editing techniques (impossible to say without a full print of Le Tournoi available). Certainly, Renoir's next film, Tire au Flanc would begin a shift toward a dominant stylistic system and diegetic construction (characterized by depth of field, mobile framing, multiple protagonists, etc.) that marked Renoir as a unique and exceptional filmmaker. Interesting also, that it was not sound film production that spurred this stylistic shift for Renoir as Tire was a silent film (although, I do believe it may have been the imminence of sound film that also had Renoir thinking one step ahead).

While short and perhaps lacking in real pathos (for me), this is a great example of the sheer imaginative fun that movies rarely possess nowadays. From a horse-back sword fight in the sky to snow that turns into fruit, fantasy reigns supreme in this film. Catherine Hesslinger is captivating in the lead role (though she is even more remarkable in the less interesting "Charleston"). Seeing these silent shorts of Renoir's have helped me understand how he was capable of putting so many wonderful, unusual scenes into "The Rules of the Game"; I see how playful he was. Above all, one takes away Renoir's exuberant love for film in this movie. You can find it in the 7 film set released by Lion's Gate with remarks by Scorsese.

Little Match Girl, The (1928)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Jean Renoir's short film based on the story of Hans Christian Anderson features the director's then wife Catherine Hessling in the title role. The film tells the story of a poor girl who goes out on a snowy night to sell matches. She's unable to sell any and instead of going back to her shack, she stays out keeping warm from the matches. She strikes one lucky match and begins to see all sorts of strange things through a toy shop window. This film starts off pretty well but slowly gets boring as the surreal aspects of the story start to set in. The fantasy side of things are pretty good but it's clear Renoir was going for something a tad bit surreal and the budget just didn't allow for this to work. All of the fantasy sequences are good on their own but none of them are done well enough to really work. Hessling is much too old to be playing the character but she is able to bring an innocence to the role.