Film-Philosophy
Journal | Salon | Portal (ISSN 1466-4615)
Vol. 8 No. 8, March 2003
Michael Abecassis
Le Petit Theatre de Renoir:
Martin O'Shaughnessy's _Jean Renoir_
Martin
O'Shaughnessy Manchester and New York:
Manchester University Press, 2000 ISBN 0719050626 hb;
0719050634 pb 251 pp. _Boudu sauve des eaux_
(1932), _Madame Bovary_ (1933), _La Grande illusion_ (1937),
_La Bete humaine_ (1938), and _La Regle du jeu_ (1939) are,
among an impressive filmography of more than thirty films,
some of the most famous classics by Jean Renoir which have
reached the status of lasting popularity not only in France,
but world-wide. The work of Renoir has led to numerous books
and articles, generally focusing on his major films, but
little is generally known about the films that Renoir shot
during his exile in America and which seem to have been
overshadowed by those produced in the golden age of French
cinema. O'Shaughnessy's
well-documented study entitled _Jean Renoir_ (2000) is part
of a collection on French and British film directors.
Previous issues in the series include work on Melies,
Godard, Besson, and Beinex. O'Shaughnessy's purpose in this
detailed book, enriched with synopses of Renoir's films and
a complete filmography to guide the reader, is to give a
general overview of the complete works of Renoir, as well as
trying to find coherence, underlying themes, and
correspondences which unite all his films. Renoir's films
have undoubtedly been influenced by the historical and
ideological context in which they were produced, as well as
the itinerary of the director himself from the pre-war years
until his exile in Hollywood, but the question of whether he
has given prominence to these factors in his films is
debatable. After exploring Renoir's
reflections about his own work, and the way he was perceived
by his critics as well as the influence of his father, the
well-known Impressionist painter Pierre Auguste,
O'Shaughnessy follows the career of the writer, director,
and actor from the silent era and the early 1930s (the
Popular Front era when Marxists and Socialists allied) to
the films he created during his Hollywood exile, and later
in the early 1950s when he returned to France. Renoir
published three major books later in his life. His popular
memoir _My Life and My Films_ appeared in 1975 and followed
a book about his father, _Renoir_ (1962), and a novel _Les
Cahiers du capitaine Georges_ (1966). These are personal
documents about the man, the actor, and the director, and as
such warrant focus. O'Shaughnessy's analysis is
chronological and falls into six main parts: 1. 'An Uneven
Career', 2. 'Renoir and the Critics', 3. 'The Early Films',
4. 'The Popular Front Years', 5. 'Renoir Americain', and 6.
'Late Renoir'. The first two chapters broach the issues of
Renoir's political commitment or non-commitment in his
writings, and oppose the Renoir of the Left with the Renoir
of the auteurists. The auteurist critic hopes to identify
the unique personality of the filmmaker through his entire
work, and indeed there are recurring stylistic features
throughout. However, having an auteurist approach alone
would be too restrictive, as his films are far more complex
and multi-dimensional. Unlike auteurist critics, who simply
perceive his work as the expression of his personal style,
or Left-side critics, who describe his films essentially in
the light of political and ideological background,
O'Shaughnessy feels that the complete works of Renoir is
more a combination of various influences, among which lie
aesthetics, sociology, national identity, politics, and
ideology, without speaking of literature. Renoir's films
have been adaptations of authors such as Flaubert,
Maupassant, Zola, and Simenon, and this adds a symbolic and
philosophical dimension. In the following chapters
O'Shaughnessy concentrates on the films produced by Renoir.
He first of all intends to analyse the 1920s films from two
perspectives: 'first, for their engagement with the tensions
and anxieties that marked the France of the 1920's . . .
second, for a consistent social vision' (62). Renoir's early
films, such as _La Fille de l'eau_ (1924), a mixture of
neo-realism, farce, and surrealism, and _La Petite marchande
d'allumettes_ (1928), regarded as the best Renoir film of
the silent era, with charming special effects, were modest
films and not as successful as his later films. They can be
considered early experiments. Although they show Renoir's
lack of maturity as a filmmaker, they are cinematic
achievements. Looking at Renoir's
contribution to the golden age of French cinema,
O'Shaughnessy pairs up _La Chienne__ with _Madame Bovary_,
which show obvious similarities such as their 'focus on the
power of money and class' and the way they both 'ground
their realism' (83). Renoir's early sound classic _La
Chienne_ (1931) is a tragi-comedy which will prefigure the
focus of 1930s French cinema on the lives of fringe society
and the working class, not only in Renoir's films but also
in those of, for example, Carne or Duvivier. There are
indeed strong links between these three directors. _La
Chienne_ presents us with an incisive analysis of class
structure and human conduct and cruelty. _Boudu sauve des
eaux_ (1932), which encompasses the farcical and the tragic
possesses a near-documentary approach. With their depictions
of the French capital -- its parks, cafes, music, quayside
-- the films manage to capture the spirit of pre-war Paris.
_Madame Bovary_ (1933), drawn from the novel by Gustave
Flaubert, is poignant, absorbing, and tragic, primarily on
account of the acting of Valentine Tessier in the lead role.
Renoir's technique of filming from a distance gives the
impression that the viewer is a voyeur peeping through each
scene and a participant in the pathos of the unfolding
dramas. Renoir's early neo-realist
experiment with talkies consisted in taking his camera out
on the streets and out into rural France, using untrained
actors in principal roles, such as the native Southern
speakers with regional accents in _Toni_ (1934). As Renoir
phrased it: 'My aim was to give the impression that I was
carrying a camera and microphone in my pocket and recording
whatever came my way, regardless of its comparative
importance.' [1] _Le Crime de Monsieur Lange_ (1936)
conveys an anti-capitalist message and shows the political
mood of the pre-war period in France. In this film, Amedee
Lange (Renee Lefevre) symbolises the socialist hero
struggling against the capitalist, obnoxious Monsieur Batala
(Jules Berry). There is also quite clearly a social message
in _Les Bas-fonds_ (1936), drawn from Gorki's play. The
pairing of Gabin and Jouvet, the ruined aristocrat on the
one hand and the young proletarian burglar on the other,
makes the film entertaining as well as poignant. In his
analysis O'Shaughnessy pairs up Popular Front films such as
_Le Crime de Monsieur Lange_ with _La Vie est a nous_, as
well as _La Grande illusion_ with _La Marseillaise_, to show
the evolution of the backdrop message from radicalism to
nationalism. _La Grande illusion_
(1937) starring Eric Von Stroheim, Jean Gabin, and Pierre
Fresnay, has reached the status of masterpiece. Banned by
the Nazis during the Second World War, this constitutes a
very powerful antiwar film, mostly on account of the
outstanding performances of the actors, who seem perfectly
moulded for their parts. Von Stroheim plays a soldier from
aristocratic origins who appears to be the German
counterpart of Fresnay, aka Capital de Boeldieu. Lieutenant
Marechal (Gabin) is also part of the French army, but his
origins are working class. Renoir would describe the film as
'a story about human relationships'. However, social
divisions and prejudices are clearly obstacles in this film
more than language, religion, or ethnic barriers. _La
Marseillaise_ (1938), an historical epic which commemorates
the French Revolution, is another representation of the
director's 'engagement with a tormented period' (103). It is
successful as an historical account, but it is more a string
of episodes, and as such, on the whole, its lacks unity and
dramatic thrust. Moreover, behind this depiction of the
Revolution, there is an underlying political orientation and
a Frontist message. O'Shaughnessy focuses on
aspects such as Renoir's political and ideological stances,
anti-Semitism, and the philosophical dimension which
surrounds the symbolic picture of the *femme fatale* and his
exploration of the destructive and delusive representation
of the social world. Whether it be called literary realism,
naturalism, social or poetic realism, one enters the
psychology of Renoir's characters, dragged by the same
motives and unravelling inexorably to their fate and often
to their death. As O'Shaughnessy makes clear, Renoir's films
'show the destruction of a self-deluding individual by a
corrupt society' (69). In Renoir's adaptation of Zola's _La
Bete humaine_ (1938), starring Jean Gabin and Simone Simon,
the image of the railway and locomotive is central to
symbolise both 'the transformatory power of technology and .
. . the regressive, bestial nature of passion' (141). The
proletarian hero is torn between these two worlds, one
progressive and associated with modern industrial
capitalism, the other atavistic and self-destructive. The
move from platonic to sexual love has a foretaste of
original sin, leading the characters into the fallen world,
a post-edenic wandering, and eventually to death. Renoir's human comedy is a
microcosm and a stage 'shaped by social-class relationships'
(107). For instance _La Regle du jeu_ (1939), which was
overtly criticised when it was released and later censored,
before reaching the status of one of the greatest films in
the history of French cinema, is often regarded by critics
as a blatant attack on the bourgeoisie. As O'Shaughnessy
shows, the absence of cohesion between the proletarian and
bourgeois characters is the source of disorder, and is
finally fatal. One should read through the apparent chaos.
Trying to escape the claustrophobic *peau de chagrin* of
their social milieu, Renoir's characters are all in search
of freedom and of their own self. _La Regle du jeu_ is a
sophisticated piece which does not comply with any
particular genre. On the contrary, it is a combination of
different genres, interweaving at the same time slapstick
farce, drama, music-hall, comedy, and tragedy, thus creating
a complete sense of anarchy behind this caricature of
mankind's nature and behaviour. The upper class, of which
Robert de la Chesnaye is the embodiment, blindly complies
with the *rules of the game*, showing cruelty (the
slaughtering of rabbits during the hunt game prepares us for
a fatal ending) and hardly any emotion towards their
servants, while the latter indulge in the more frivolous
games of courtship and love. The constant game metaphor
brings to mind the image of a chessboard where characters in
this sterile world 'are like pawns in some absurd game'
(148) and could be seen to represent 'a microcosm which
stands for the nation itself' (149). In the 1940s Renoir
retreated to the America, directing _ Swamp Water_ (1941),
_This Land is Mine_ (1943), _The Southerner_ (1945), _Diary
of a Chambermaid_ (1947), and _Woman on the Beach_ (1947),
films which are generally ranked among his least successful.
Nonetheless, for Bazin and Scherer, the American years led
to an inward search and a purification in Renoir's style
which became more 'spiritual than aesthetic'
(154). Renoir's post-war films
draw on aesthetics and Impressionist motifs, with an
emphasis on colour and music. _Le Carrosse d'or_ (1952),
tinged with melancholic realism, marks Renoir's return to
European filmmaking after his Hollywood exile. O'Shaughnessy
insists that some often neglected films of Renoir's later
career are worth analysing in spite of any explicit
political dimension. As he pinpoints pertinently, films of
that period 'engage consistently with their socio-historical
context and the director's lack of commitment should not be
taken for *detachment*' (225). _Le Carrosse d'or_ is, with
_French Cancan_ (1955) and _Elena et les hommes_ (1956), the
first film in the 50s trilogy of Renoir films related to the
past, love, and artifice. The beauty of _Le Carrosse d'or_
lies in the performance of Anna Magnani as the leading lady
of a touring Commedia Dell'Arte theatrical troupe. _Le
Dejeuner sur l'herbe_ (1959), which is reminiscent of
Manet's famous painting, is also a classic of Renoir's later
period. Indeed, certain scenes of extreme beauty in the film
conjure up an Impressionist painting. In _Le Testament du
Docteur Cordelier_ (1959) one finds motifs dear to Renoir.
In the wake of his late-1930s film _La Bete humaine_,
Renoir's representation is Manichean. Cordelier and Opale
are two sides of the same character of the Dr Jekyll and Mr
Hyde type, driven between good and evil, between the
spiritual and the libidinous. The often underestimated _Le
Caporal Epingle_ (1962) is an entertaining comedy, echoing
some of Renoir's earlier work. And Renoir's last film, _Le
Petit theatre de Renoir_ (1969), is made up of four separate
vignettes, along with a musical interlude, all theatrically
combined, and encapsulates some familiar Renoir techniques
and themes (popular music, opera, art, the theatrical and
social imaginary). One could regret that in
this volume Renoir's direction of actors, the technical
aspects of his films, his camera work, as well as the
cinematic quality and sound effects of his films, have been
little emphasized. Since his early films (_On purge bebe_
1931) and the dawn of sound films Renoir has made the most
of sound technology. As he himself put it in his
autobiography: 'People imagine that in a
talkie nothing matters except the actual dialogue. I, too,
believe in dialogue, but to me it is only part of the sound
track: a sigh, the creak of a door, the sound of footsteps
on the pavement, things such as these can say as much as the
spoken word.' [2] On the cinematic technique
of Renoir, one could mention as an example the long shot,
which in _La Regle du jeu_ gives a naturalistic impression
to the film. Renoir is said to have been one of the
forunners of the film noir in America, and his designed sets
and particular lighting present the viewer with an artifice
which is part of what critics have referred to as
*psychological realism*. Baron Edward Turk, in his book
_Child of Paradise_, gives us a very good insight into
Marcel Carne's work, illuminated by psychoanalysis and
philosophy. He also offers a very comprehensive and thorough
analysis of his films, with a greater emphasis on the
director's techniques and directorial innovations.
O'Shaughnessy's book could have drawn on Turk's detailed
analyses to emphasize Renoir's techniques and symbolic
underlying messages. What O'Shaughnessy does
show is that there is not one single axis of analysis of
Renoir's films, but that they indulge in a far more complex
pattern, where the social, historical, aesthetic, as well as
philosophical, intermingle. As a comprehensive document on
Renoir's career, this book is a major contribution to French
film studies: its clarity and focus make it accessible for
film specialists, scholars, students and cinema lovers
alike. Through this work one comes to question Renoir's
political commitment, and rediscover films that often remain
unmentioned among his more acclaimed masterpieces, films
whose techniques have inspired generations of actors and
directors ever since the New Wave era. University of Oxford,
England Notes 1. Renoir, quoted in
Annette Insdorf, _Francois Truffaut_ (Cambridge and New
York: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 70. 2. Renoir, _My Life and My
Films_ (London: Collins, 1974), p. 104. Bibliography Chazal, R., _ Marcel
Carne_ (Paris: Seghers, 1965). Insdorf, A., _Francois
Truffaut_ (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University
Press, 1994). Turk, E. B., _Child of
Paradise: Marcel Carne and the Golden Age of French Cinema_
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1989).
Webography http://www.ac-reunion.fr/pedagogie/lyvergerp/TL/Renoir.htm http://members.aol.com/MG4273/renoir.htm http://www.nyfavideo.com/content/cat-RENOIR.htm http://www.inblackandwhite.com/FrenchFilmsv2.0 http://sidonie9.free.fr/cine/lex_tourn.html http://frenchfilms.topcities.com/fr_jrenoir.html http://frenchfilms.topcities.com/Best_1930s.html Copyright ©
Film-Philosophy 2004 Michael Abecassis, 'Le
Petit Theatre de Renoir: Martin O'Shaughnessy's _Jean
Renoir_', _Film-Philosophy_, vol. 8 no. 8, March 2004
<http://www.film-philosophy.com/vol8-2004/n8abecassis>. Read a response to this
text: Martin
O'Shaughnessy, 'Rethinking Renoir: A Reply to Michael
Abecassis', _Film-Philosophy_, vol. 8 no. 9, March 2004
<http://www.film-philosophy.com/vol8-2004/n9oshaughnessy>. Join the _Film-Philosophy_
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