Lucía and Jun-Dai at the BFI on 31 July 2012.
Jun-Dai:
In some sense this is a 1946 film, I suppose, but it seems wrong to label it that way.
There were a lot of things I liked about this film, but in some ways it was nice that it was so short. I think it would have been difficult to watch the same material and same simplistic story stretched out over 90 minutes.
Also, I’m pretty tired of movie scenes that involve a woman being forcibly kissed (or worse), but then deciding halfway through that she likes it. It’s a remarkably persistent trope. I suppose a 1936 filmmaker shouldn’t be too heavily criticised for what 70 more years of filmmaking will overuse, but it’s tiresome nevertheless.
Rodolphe was quite a caricature. The moustache cover he wears in his first scene is delightful.
A bit of beautiful filmmaking when the rains finally arrive, indicating that all the fun and play has moved on to something more serious.
Anatole’s hair is amazing. Everything about him is amazing, really. Also quite a caricature, but it’s hard to figure out what he is a caricature _of_. He’s a very odd character.
Madame Dufour, however, is most certainly my favourite character (and performance). So very French!