Criterion Collection: Eclispe 22: Sacha Guitry [DVD] [1936] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]

A tyro of French stage and screen as writer, actor, and director, Sacha Guitry (1885-1957) is 50-ish and beefy in these films. He is often disposed to speak flatly and rapidly at great length, and I had the impression of a rusty buzzsaw cutting planks off a log, in a timbre associated with that of Harvey Fierstein. All four pics have good parts for his third wife, Jacqueline Delubac (married 1935-1939), bedecked in chic Parisian outfits and makeup (surprisngly heavy eyebrows). Now onto the films in My Order of Ascending Merit:

DE'SIRE', 1937, 97 min

At well-to-do Jacqueline Delubac's domicile, De'sire' (Guitry) applies for the valet position. She checks his reference with his former female employer, who implies that De'sire' is sexually aggressive--which puts Jacqueline off, but De'sire' with his overwhelming mouth persuades her to hire him. The other household staff comprise maid Arletty and cook Pauline Carton. All travel to the country house, where Jacqueline continues her affair with a balding minister, but unfortunately talks in her sleep about the sexual threat of De'sire'. The household is thrown into disarray, finally evoking a buzzsaw monologue from De'sire'.

QUADRILLE, 1938, 95 min

Newspaper tycoon Guitry has had a long affair with stage actress Gaby Morlay (1893-1964), and may finally pop the question of marriage. But American movie star Georges Grey (1911-1954) descends upon Paris like morning sunshine and, by gosh, promptly seduces Gaby. The aftermath is a very long verbal exchange between Guitry and Gaby. Star newspaper reporter Jacqueline Delubac tries to intercede to good effect, and Guitry is attracted to her, and vice versa. As complication, the American movie star has to leave Paris. Will he be back to do the right thing by Gaby or abscond as a cad? (Personally, I found Gaby Morlay, at five feet, to be obviously undersize as uncleverly photographed, her hard simple face distorted with "corrective" insect-antennae brows. Her birdlike warbled nasal French, like that of co-player Jacqueline in this pic, annoyed. In the final minutes, she's stuck with a terrible artichoke hat.)

PEARLS OF THE CROWN, 1937, 105 min

Of Guthrie's films, this extravagant, multilingual, wildly inventive historical romp achieved popularity internationally. He hashes together four centuries of Italian, French, and English monarchies in creating the legend of the seven great pearls--four of which finally decorate the English crown, and three strays which are traced in the 1930s by an Italian, a French, and an English gentleman. Some actors play multiple roles. Guitry is Jean Martin, Francois I, Barras, and Napoleon III. Robust Lyn Harding is delightful as the modern king's aide-de-camp and Henry VIII. Jacqueline Delubac is affecting as Mary Queen of Scots readying for the ax. Jean-Louis Barrault briefly stuns as young Napoleon. As the chocolate-covered Queen of Abyssinia, Arletty is highly amusing, her vocal track being played backward to create an exotic tongue.

STORY OF A CHEAT, 1936, 81 min

Matured by a wig and Harold Lloyd eyeglasses (elsewhere, photos show Guitry wore such emphatic specs in life), Guitry as the Cheat is seated at a sidewalk cafe and commences to write his memoirs. As the son of a grocer and as a WWI soldier, he is played by other actors. From early on, life seems to teach the Cheat that dishonesty is best, indeed inescapable as circumstances arise. The WWI sequence includes a rare appearance by the troubled alcoholic chanteuse Fre'hel (1891-1951) roughly singing "Et v'la pourquoi" (And that's why; lyrics by Guitry). The film includes docu footage of Monaco & Monte Carlo, as the Cheat becomes a successful gambler. But then, one evening he sees in the casino his former army acquaintance, one-armed and stolidly playing cards, and the Cheat remembers...

Yes, I said at the outset that I found Guitry's voice unattractive, especially since it's his primary acting tool, his countenance too frozen. Yet "Cheat," astoundingly, is almost entirely his voice-over, an often frowned-upon technique in drama. But in this instance the images become all the more gripping, or the more amusing in presenting the grocer's boy. The sawing has become a frazzled bow on old dry cello strings.

FIVE STARS! Merci beaucoup, Criterion, a la recherche du temps perdu et des films use's.