L'homme qui rit

A really pointless remake of a beautiful original. Even given the changes to Gwymphaine this could still have been worthwhile. But this is one of those typically unfocused co-productions (bad dubbing, second rate acting, ott music) that plagued cinema screens in the 60's, and now thanks to TCM UK it too frequently turns up on Satelite here. First time I saw the title in the schedules I got excited and then I saw the year.

Don't waste your time on this one.

Jean Sorel stars as the disfigured Gwynplainte (here renamed Angelo, just because) and as some random guy with the same (undisfigured) face in this sort of remake of the classic movie starring COnrad Veidt. It's still about the cruelty of the Borgias, if that means anything.

It looks like director-cowriter Sergio Corbucci decided to turn the Victor Hugo story into one of pure body horror. Kudos to art director Alessandro Dell'Orco, and to cinematographer Enzio Barboni for the beautiful glass shots, but this is just another swords-and-sandal movie with some pretension. With Lisa Gastoni, Edmond Purdom, and Ferdinando Poggi.

They did not credit Victor Hugo , which was a wise move ; like he did in "the hunchback of Notre Dame ", the writer depicted a human being considered a monster .The movie is one thousand light years from the novel.

There are some similarities though : both disfigured Angelo (Gwynplaine in the book) and blind Dea were adopted by a travelling performer ;and a high-born lady ,a duchess,falls for the ugly man (here represented by Lucrezia Borgia , but the noble was a virgin in the book!).

The rest was written from start to finish by the screenwriters; it does not take place in queen Anne 's reign but under the Borgias' and it is a pretty entertaining swashbuckler , which sometimes recalls "the prisoner of Zenda" ; Jean Sorel plays a double rôle , the "laughing man " and Borgia's enemy, a virtuous noble who fights against his tyranny : French Sorel's good looks went against him in his native country (there was no room for two Alain Delon) and he often worked in Italy ;to play an ugly figure was certainly an act of self-renewal for this rather inexpressive but handsome actor.

With its sudden new developments ,and its hilarious implausibilities ( the reconstructive surgery was far ahead of its time ,at Borgia 's time,if one is to believe the screenwriters; a psychological shock ,and voila, she can see) , the movie is enjoyable ,if you do not take it seriously ,of course. Never a dull moment.

As I'm writing this TCM America will be showing 1966's The Man Who Laughs, a French/Italian co-production. I saw this movie when I was boy on the tv on a Saturday afternoon. I knew nothing about the classic novel by Victor Hugo nor the classic Silent movie that starred Conrad Veidt. I was fascinated by this story of a deformed young male acrobat. He wears a leather mask over his lower face to hide the permanent "grin" that was carved into his face as a small boy. The young man is also in love with a blind woman. After a performance with a small circus this young man reveals his deformity setting in motion tragic events. Our "hero" is 'discovered' & seduced by a noblewoman; he is enticed into coming a head henchman of the noblewoman's brother. The blind woman is also 'discovered' by a young nobleman who also falls in love with her. This nobleman is the enemy of the family who our "hero" now serves. You can guess what's going to happen; mostly.

Anyway as a kid I found this fascinating. Going by the previous reviews & what I remember I'm going to say that the people behind this production were inspired by the classic silent film to do their own take on the basic premise. And it seems to me that the director, writer & who else also inspired by the '50's movie version of Scaramouche, which also has a deformed theatre performer. This is Not a Remake.

The setting is moved from 18th c. England to Renaissance Italy where politics were literally cut-throat. And this is mostly like a low to moderate production using costumes, props from other productions and the very plentiful ancient & scenic Italian buildings & landscape giving an authentic atmosphere. This is not a great nor classic movie; there are a few things done, story-wise, that would make an adult viewer scratch their head. This is a B-grade costume drama/thriller that should be appreciated on it's own; associating this movie to better works of literature and cinema with the same title would just ruin the experience. I gave it 5 stars just to be fair.

To my own personal regret, I haven't yet seen the 1928 classic on which this French/Italian version is based. The basic premise is truly intriguing and you can derive from this film that the original has got to be a fantastic film. The pivot character is a young man called Angelo (Jean Sorel from Lucio Fulci's "Lizard in a Woman's Skin") who got kidnapped as a boy by gypsies in order to turn him into an acrobat and sell him to a circus. His face was horribly mutilated on purpose (he appears to have a constant grin) to increase his "value" as a circus-freak even more. The story is set in 16th century Spain (or is it Italy?) and Angelo is torn between civil wars and an unanswered love. I hope to see the original soon, because I understand that this setting is different and a lot more confusing. This version is overlong and quickly becomes boring. Moreover, the screenplay makes a ridiculous twist near the end, when we're supposed to believe that surgeons in the 16th century were flawlessly capable of performing complex plastic surgery. The make-up effects are admirable, the body count is enormous and Sorel's acting is well above average. Even though a remake, "The Man Who Laughs" is a movie with great potential and it's a shame the execution is so darn poorly.