Word: cherbourg
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...doubt I'd believe in the value of pure cinema at all, except that, three or four years ago, I saw a little French film from the 1960s called The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. The idea for the film sounds a little strange when I tell it: a love story that's also a French musical and a slice-of-life melodrama in old Hollywood style. I was a little hesitant to make my first "movie love" rave a French film--it just seems so pretentious. But, well, so it's French. So kill me. Of course there is something...
...drafted to fight in the 1950s French-Algerian War and the girl (achingly lovely Catherine Deneuve) back home. It could be a country song, or a classic short story, or a Doctor Zhivago epic. But the film's sense of place--capturing the wetness, char and sadness of provincial Cherbourg--and its compassion for all the characters sets it apart. I would love to say it's the story that gets me. But when I recall the film, that's not what comes back...
...think of the images, every one suffused with emotion, freshness and loveliness. I could write a whole book about the colors in the film. The film was shot on location on the Normandy coast, but it looks like the greatest stage set ever. In fact, the rainy town of Cherbourg was transformed during the production of the film with an incredible makeover of primary toned paints; every wall, streetlight, automobile and shop window harmonizes perfectly with the beautiful costumes of the characters. Sure, the art design would be several shades of twee, if it weren't so damned delightful...
Splashed color is not the only cinematic self-indulgence on the part of Demy. He also treats the audience to a variety of trick shots which to the contemporary eye seem comical in their overtness. As the lovers stroll through Cherbourg singing their famous duet, it is obvious from their utterly still arms and legs and their perfectly even gliding motion that they are not walking at all but being towed on a dolly, though the shot shows only their upper halves. An attempt to innovate on the diaolgue scene has one of the actors singing directly into the camera...
...hard to know with how much irony "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" was originally meant. At times, the film does have a sort of post-modern self-consciousness, such as when a merry mechanic sings that he can't stand singing and that he much prefers movies without singing, or in the final shot of the gas station marquis, which reads not "Cherbourg" but "Cherbourgeosie". Luckilly, theoretical issues like these cannot weigh down this proudly frothy film. Demy's Cherbourg was nearly lost to this world when the original negatives were damaged and the prints all faded to unintelligablity--his widow...