Word: gabin
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...proceeds from tonight's showing of "Grand illusion," the pre-war French film with Eric Von Stroheim and Jean Gabin, will be donated to the College DP student fund by the Liberal Union. Showings of the film, which has English sub-titles, will be at 7:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. in Fogg Museum...
...this age of Hollywood blood-and-thunder war movies, all of which preach some sort of a hackneyed message, there is nothing more refreshing than to see a brilliant war film like the twelve year-old "Grand Illusion." Starring Erich von Stroheim and Jean Gabin, this old-French epic concerns the fate of a group of French prisoners in Germany during the first World...
...Gabin and two other French officers are captured in the early days of the war and, after being treated with extreme courtesy by the members of a German fighter squadron at the front, are shuttled through a long series of PW camps inside Germany. The film deals with their fate, the death of one of them, and the subsequent escape of the other...
...Although it also has a masterful plot, perhaps the finest parts of "Grand Illusion" are a few individual scenes. For instance, on the eve of a German victory celebration, the prisoners give a revue and invite the German officers who are guarding them. In the middle of the show, Gabin hears the news the Allies have finally won this battle. He rushes on the stage, roars out the good news, and all the prisoners rise and sing the "Marsaillaise." The German officers stomp out, and Gabin is put into solitary confinement...
This was good reliable fun when Jean Gabin starred in it (Pépé le Moko, 1937) and when Charles Boyer and Hedy Lamarr adorned it (Algiers, 1938); it is good fun still. The older versions were slicker moviemaking but took this likable trash more seriously than it is worth. The new version has just about the right easygoing attitude. Peter Lorre can always be counted on. Tony Martin and Yvonne de Carlo, who have never before seemed entirely human, are simple, likable, even believable. Neatest measure of John Berry's sensible directing: the leads...