Nuit sans étoiles

Adapted from his own novel by Winston Graham - best known for 'Poldark' and 'Marnie' - I'll try not to reveal too much about the plot of this film, other than to say that there's an awful lot of it.

British audiences still living with rationing in postwar austerity Britain would have welcomed this opportunity to wallow for an hour and a half in the lap of luxury in the South of France, although much of the action takes place at night and is directed and lit for atmosphere rather than plush. The French themselves are as usual depicted as a pretty creepy and untrustworthy bunch, and even in a 'sympathetic' role like this David Farrar exudes his usual saturnine menace. All in all, good morbid fun.

Nothing new.After David Farrar regains his sight he discovers that nothing is the same as when he was blind.Farrar was an all purpose leading man who needed a good director to ensure he did not become too wooden.

Night Without Stars is directed by Anthony Pelissier and adapted to screenplay by Winston Graham from his own novel of the same name. It stars David Farrar, Nadia Gray, Maurice Teynac, Gerard Landry and June Clyde. Music is by William Alwyn and cinematography by Guy Green.

Story is set in post war France and finds Farrar as Giles Gordon, a British lawyer who has been left partially blinded by the war. Upon meeting shop assistant Alix Delaisse (Gray), he falls in love with her but soon finds she has ties to the resistance and that another suitor doesn't welcome his arrival on the scene. Soon enough Giles find himself amongst blackmailers, forgers and murderers, his life is in danger and Alix has disappeared.

The hook here is that Giles seeks out an operation to correct his sight issue and then sets about unravelling the mysteries, still pretending that he is nearly blind! The plot has a delicious slice of incredulity about it, and with the screenplay being quite literate, it rolls out as a match made in cinematic heaven. Pelissier (The Rocking Horse Winner) and Green (Great Expectations/Oliver Twist) deal firmly in chiaroscuro photography, bathing a good portion of the film in noirish visuals.

Atmosphere is a big thing in a story of this kind and Night Without Stars has it in abundance. Add in some sensuality and a quite brilliant performance by Farrar and you are good to go for a great winter's night in by the fire. 8/10

The film title suggested something more exciting than what played out. The title is better suited to a supernatural tale - are they alive or are they dead? That kind of thing. That would be a much better use of the title.

This is a spy story set on the French Riviera and stars David Farrar (Giles) as a partially sighted man who falls in love with shop assistant Nadia Gray (Alix). We are introduced to a cast of French characters who formed part of the French Resistance and who are involved in smuggling and murder. There is quite a lot going on so it is a bit complicated and, unfortunately, a bit boring.

One thing that stood out to me is the English way of pronouncing Monaco at this time in our history. David Farrar says "Monarko" with the stress on the 'ark' part of the word instead of the emphasis on the 'Mon' part of the word. MonARKo. I've also heard Tony Hancock in the 1950s say it in the same way and thought he was deliberately sabotaging the script and trying to be funny. I now think differently. Had we just not come across the country in the early 1950s so we were unsure of how to pronounce it?! Coz that is what it seems like to me. Were we just too uninformed to pronounce Monaco correctly? This isn't very long ago - so it is a pretty poor show, chaps!

The film had an interesting idea with the disappearing café but things just tick along in a rather wooden manner.

I have long thought David Farrar was more distinguished for being tall, dark, handsome and having a mellifluous voice, but he shows some real ability in this movie. He's almost blind because of a wartime injury, and living in depressed exile in southern France, when he runs into Nadia Gray. She's engaged to be married, but when he goes to confront the fiancé, he finds a corpse... then the corpse vanishes, as does a cafe.

It's written by Winston Graham from his novel -- he's better known for writing the Poldark series -- and well directed by Anthony Pelissier in his short but distinguished career in the movies. While at times it seems as if the symbolic meanings of things stick through the plot -- blindness being a metaphor for this and that -- it winds up being a highly satisfying piece of cinema.