One of the greatest (almost) lost films I've seen is Jean Renoir's "The Crime of Monsieur Lange." Renoir made it in 1936, prior to the invasion of France by German forces, and just before his two wartime masterpieces "Rules of the Game" and "Grand Illusion," which both have overshadowed it critically and in terms of popularity. But I consider "Lange" to be richer in irony, political bite, and even humanity than its more famous followers.
It relates the story of one Amedee Lange, a pulp writer for a weekly paper, published by the womanizing and ever scheming Batala, played with delicious gregariousness by Jules Berry. Lange writes the continuing western serial "Arizona Jim" for the paper, but his prose suffers the indignity of having advertising blurbs inserted into it to by Berry. When Berry, in an effort to avoid creditors, fakes his own death in a train wreck, Lange and the other workers for the paper rally and take over the publishing themselves, creating a popular and commercial success, continuing "Arizona Jim," sharing in the tasks and rewards, and even staging a (rather stagy and unconvincing) film version of the western for the local cinemas.
Renoir creates a potent political subtext by defining this community - the workers, neighbors, and friends - around a single courtyard. His camera glides through doorways and peers through the windows of apartments and shops to eavesdrop on all the personal and professional intrigues (in a way that at the time was considered outrageously overdone). Lange himself has never been outside Paris, and when people comment on the apparent "authenticity" of his western serial, he constantly corrects them - but to no avail. He is soon taken for the lover of the laundress whom his bed-ridden friend has a crush on, another misunderstanding. Lange's a fake but he barely suspects as much, as he's too concerned with trying to explain, facilitate his friends, or going along for the ride to ever express much more than a sense that he finds the situation ironic. His misunderstood, almost aggressively passive existence becomes the catalyst and center of this self-forming community, a new populist collective that's practically communist.
When Berry unexpectedly returns (dressed in a priest's outfit he's appropriated), he intends to reap the benefits of the commune's success publishing and filming the serial. Lange realizes Berry's capitalist worldview and intent to dictate over them again threatens the well-being of the community, indeed will destroy it. After a drunken party that night (in which Marcel Lévesque gives a speech, in a way reprising his role as the good-hearted sidekick in Feuillade's 1917's "Les Vampires"!) Lange leaves Berry's office and the camera follows him outside through the windows of the office. With a bravura camera pan of a full 360 degrees to take in all the elements around the central courtyard (considered quite self-indulgent then, but now practically invisible to our jaded eyes) Renoir returns to Berry, who's now lying on the cobblestones bleeding - Lange has stabbed him off-screen - yet the camera move signifies a profound emotional event has transpired and transformed the community...
Lange was made during the period that the Popular Front was gaining political ground in France, when there was optimism that people could band together and conquer the threat that Hitler was manifesting. Renoir's political themes have always been background texture rather than text "The Rules of the Game" is considered one of the best anti-war films ever made and yet the topic is never brought up in the film. Even "Grand Illusion," taking place in prisoner-of-war camps, concerns itself primarily with the class-based relations between the Germans and their captured prisoners.
Lange's positioning as the reluctant center and catalyst for the commune, as well as its inadvertent savior (by eventually committing murder, the "crime" of the title), is played in ironic set-ups. Berry is dressed as a priest for his ignoble return. Earlier Berry mentions to a priest on the train he "must be able to get away with anything" and this returning sheep in wolf's clothing is another resonance with how people put up fronts that are misunderstood. The film also manages to address, redolent in its subtext, the vagaries of pop culture, verisimilitude of representation, and personal responsibility. (None of the handful of pregnancies in the picture seem to enjoy the benefit of being in wedlock it's likely that Berry is responsible for all of them).
My favorite moment occurs at the train station, when Berry is about to flee the office for the first time. He's saying goodbye to one of his smitten secretaries (who doesn't realize what a cad he truly is). Renoir allows Berry a moment of wisdom as he tells her how to capture the sympathies of some passing young man (speaking perhaps from personal knowledge) so she won't be lost, abandoned, once he leaves her - by suggesting she pretend to cry over a departing lover on the station platform. Indeed, as Berry's train leaves, her sobs capture the attention of a passing man, whom she begins to walk with. The shot fades out with the hint of a slight smile on her face as she begins to warm to her new conquest. Amazing.
Truffaut called "Monsieur Lange" Renoir's greatest work. The film was issued by Interama on laserdisc in 1988 (now way out of print of course). It was recently issued on VHS from Kino, now OOP as well, and could use a Criterion-grade upgrade and reissue.
It relates the story of one Amedee Lange, a pulp writer for a weekly paper, published by the womanizing and ever scheming Batala, played with delicious gregariousness by Jules Berry. Lange writes the continuing western serial "Arizona Jim" for the paper, but his prose suffers the indignity of having advertising blurbs inserted into it to by Berry. When Berry, in an effort to avoid creditors, fakes his own death in a train wreck, Lange and the other workers for the paper rally and take over the publishing themselves, creating a popular and commercial success, continuing "Arizona Jim," sharing in the tasks and rewards, and even staging a (rather stagy and unconvincing) film version of the western for the local cinemas.
Renoir creates a potent political subtext by defining this community - the workers, neighbors, and friends - around a single courtyard. His camera glides through doorways and peers through the windows of apartments and shops to eavesdrop on all the personal and professional intrigues (in a way that at the time was considered outrageously overdone). Lange himself has never been outside Paris, and when people comment on the apparent "authenticity" of his western serial, he constantly corrects them - but to no avail. He is soon taken for the lover of the laundress whom his bed-ridden friend has a crush on, another misunderstanding. Lange's a fake but he barely suspects as much, as he's too concerned with trying to explain, facilitate his friends, or going along for the ride to ever express much more than a sense that he finds the situation ironic. His misunderstood, almost aggressively passive existence becomes the catalyst and center of this self-forming community, a new populist collective that's practically communist.
When Berry unexpectedly returns (dressed in a priest's outfit he's appropriated), he intends to reap the benefits of the commune's success publishing and filming the serial. Lange realizes Berry's capitalist worldview and intent to dictate over them again threatens the well-being of the community, indeed will destroy it. After a drunken party that night (in which Marcel Lévesque gives a speech, in a way reprising his role as the good-hearted sidekick in Feuillade's 1917's "Les Vampires"!) Lange leaves Berry's office and the camera follows him outside through the windows of the office. With a bravura camera pan of a full 360 degrees to take in all the elements around the central courtyard (considered quite self-indulgent then, but now practically invisible to our jaded eyes) Renoir returns to Berry, who's now lying on the cobblestones bleeding - Lange has stabbed him off-screen - yet the camera move signifies a profound emotional event has transpired and transformed the community...
Lange was made during the period that the Popular Front was gaining political ground in France, when there was optimism that people could band together and conquer the threat that Hitler was manifesting. Renoir's political themes have always been background texture rather than text "The Rules of the Game" is considered one of the best anti-war films ever made and yet the topic is never brought up in the film. Even "Grand Illusion," taking place in prisoner-of-war camps, concerns itself primarily with the class-based relations between the Germans and their captured prisoners.
Lange's positioning as the reluctant center and catalyst for the commune, as well as its inadvertent savior (by eventually committing murder, the "crime" of the title), is played in ironic set-ups. Berry is dressed as a priest for his ignoble return. Earlier Berry mentions to a priest on the train he "must be able to get away with anything" and this returning sheep in wolf's clothing is another resonance with how people put up fronts that are misunderstood. The film also manages to address, redolent in its subtext, the vagaries of pop culture, verisimilitude of representation, and personal responsibility. (None of the handful of pregnancies in the picture seem to enjoy the benefit of being in wedlock it's likely that Berry is responsible for all of them).
My favorite moment occurs at the train station, when Berry is about to flee the office for the first time. He's saying goodbye to one of his smitten secretaries (who doesn't realize what a cad he truly is). Renoir allows Berry a moment of wisdom as he tells her how to capture the sympathies of some passing young man (speaking perhaps from personal knowledge) so she won't be lost, abandoned, once he leaves her - by suggesting she pretend to cry over a departing lover on the station platform. Indeed, as Berry's train leaves, her sobs capture the attention of a passing man, whom she begins to walk with. The shot fades out with the hint of a slight smile on her face as she begins to warm to her new conquest. Amazing.
Truffaut called "Monsieur Lange" Renoir's greatest work. The film was issued by Interama on laserdisc in 1988 (now way out of print of course). It was recently issued on VHS from Kino, now OOP as well, and could use a Criterion-grade upgrade and reissue.