Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brilliant New-Wave Thriller., 6 Feb 2003
Ascenseur Pour L'Echafaud along with Les Mistons and Et Dieu...Crea La Femme is seen as the birth of the French New Wave, shortly after this films such as A Bout de Souffle and Les Quatre Cents Coups followed. As Breathless, Bande a Part & Shoot the Pianist, this is heavily inflected with the influence of the Film Noir mode in Hollywood- Lift to the Scaffold not being dissimilar to such films as Double Indemnity & The Postman Always Rings Twice. Maurice Ronet plays Julien Tavernier- an ex-Army officer who had been involved in Algeria- he is having an affair with his boss's wife (Jeanne Moreau) & they have a plan to murder her husband. The perfect plan is put into practice, with a nice nod towards the ethics of the arms trade, the only problem being a ringing phone & a forgotten detail. As Tavernier is about to make the perfect exit he sees the missing link, returns to the building...& is trapped in the lift in the building where the corpse is waiting to be discovered. Meanwhile Tavernier's car is stolen by a young couple, seen by Moreau, & their adventure leads to a German couple, some champagne, a photograph & a gun... Lift to the Scaffold works very well as a thriller, Miles Davis' brilliant soundtrack (improvised to images, the musical equivalent of the New Wave approach to film) compounds this feeling- one scene where Tavernier dangles from a lift is as adrenaline fuelled as anything like Die Hard. There are some great twists, as with Postman/Twice there is an ironic twist regarding murder- though I'm thinking more of Cain's book- where the protoganist is found guilty of an accident, but innocent of the murder he committed. Familiar iconography to the Nouvelle Vague appears- the gun, the raincoat, the car, roads, girls with short hair in beds, the natural way in which it is shot ,cafe's, telephones- reminding you of later works such as Breathless, Alphaville, Shoot the Pianist, Le Peau Douce, Pierret Le Fou & Les Quatre Cents Coups. The end scenes are even more inventive- the interrogation scene shot to a black-backdrop- like a theatre; this can be seen as an influence on scenes in George Lucas's THX-1138- which merely reversese the colour scheme (black to white). Another brilliant use of imagery is the use of developing/developed photographs- still images telling a story in a frozen manner not unlike La Jetee. Lift to the Scaffold has dated very well, anyone who loves Film Noir should adore this, though the feeling of cool nihilistic youth ties in with the more enjoyable early works of the New Wave- such as A Bout de Souffle and Bande a Part. For anyone who has wondered about the validity of the New Wave & been confounded by the dull costume drama of The Last Metro or the oblique Eloge de l'amour- here is a major reason why this movement was so vital to cinema. A classic.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Top floor film noir from one of the greats, 3 April 2007
This was Louis Malle's first. Previously he had worked with Jacques Cousteau on "The Silent World" (interestingly enough) and now tried his hand at film noir. Several things fell into place to make this debut a memorable one.
First, he was able to get Jeanne Moreau to play Florence Carala. She had previously been mostly a stage and B-movie player who was obviously very talented, but as Malle put it, not considered really photogenic. What she becomes after her performance here is a premier star of the French cinema partially because of the way she is photographed, and partly because she was so perfectly suited to the character, which I suspect she helped to create. She does a lot silently or with just a few words in the scenes where she walks the streets of Paris, frantic because her lover and fellow murder conspirator, Julien Tavernier (Maurice Ronet) has stood her up and she cannot understand what has happened.
Second, Malle's collaboration with screenwriter and novelist Roger Nimier adapting a roman thriller by Noel Calef to the screen turned out to be exactly right for the material, especially because they used mostly just the plot of the novel and expanded Moreau's role.
The third factor was the fortuitous jazz score by Miles Davis. Davis happened to be in Paris as the movie was being edited and Malle was able to talk him into doing a trumpet-centered original score, said to have been composed on the fly late one night and early the next morning as Moreau drank champagne and listened.
"Ascenseur pour l'echafaud," like so many American film noirs that it frankly resembles, is a murder done for love and money gone wrong. It is both a mistake by the murderer and fate itself that traps Julien Tavernier. But there is an intriguing complication in the person of young Louis (Georges Poujouly) who steals Julien's car and takes the flower girl (who admired the dashing Tavernier from afar) on an ill-fated joy ride. Unlike most of Malle's work to come, this is clearly a plot-driven, commercial flick (but oh, so exquisitely done!) without a hint of the usual autobiographical elements for which Malle is so well-known.
The Criterion Collection two disc set features interviews with Moreau, Malle and others, and includes Malle's student film, "Crazeologie," (after a Charlie Parker tune) a "theater of the absurd" little ditty about which I can only say I would never have guessed that Louis Malle was the auteur. "Elevator to the Gallows" itself is a beautifully restored high-definition black and white transfer with new and excellent subtitles. There is a booklet with an insightful review by Terrence Rafferty and part of a very interesting interview with Malle conducted by Philip French.
By the way, Malle was 24-years-old when he made this film and commented that he was very worried about his ability to work with actors since he had "spent four years" previously "filming fish"! (quoting from the Philip French interview). He gives Jeanne Moreau credit for being "incredibly helpful" until he lost his fear of actors.
So, see this for Jeanne Moreau, one of the legends of the French cinema, who displays here a kind of magnetic sexuality that had me thoroughly intrigued.
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Classic Louis Malle with great Miles Davis jazz track, 1 Jan 2004
"When Miles was touring France, he was engaged to play a background score to the film 'Ascenseur pour L'echafaud'... the recording was made at night in a Paris radio studio and the atmosphere was very relaxed. The musicians watched the principal scenes of the film and improvised as they watched. It is important to stress the improvisatory nature of the music as it is most unusual to allow any degree of freedom to musicians recording a score where it is so essential to attain perfect synchronisation. At one point, during the playing of Diner au Motel, a fragment of skin was detatched from Miles' lip and into the embrouchure, but he just kept on playing." Albert McCarty wrote on the cover notes for the vinyl "Jazz Track" ablum(CL1268). Pierre Michelot (Bass), Rene Urtreger (Piano), Barney Wilen (Tenor).
Louis Malle directed his own screenplay for this fast-moving thriller with many twists. Jeanne Moreau plays the beautiful wife caught the tangled web.
In the history of film making it is most noted for being one of the first with a jazz score, with Miles Davis setting the standard for the use of jazz in films involving violence and crime. This is Miles Davis at his best.
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