The Sunday Intertitle: Snow Day
The weatherman actually prophesied snow for this weekend, but it appears to have not happened. I was looking forward to it, but then I realised that Abel Gance’s NAPOLEON was showing in Bo’ness and that mushy precipitation might interfere with my traveling. So it’s worked out OK.
What’s also worked out is that I seem to be blogging my way through French history via period movies. I can probably get a good week out of Napoleon and chums, easily. Maybe we can bring this up to WWI by the time I reach the end of JUDEX, thus forming a kind of temporal loop, or something?
What’s a good movie set in the immediate post-Napoleon era? I dimly recall learning about Napoleon III at school but can’t recall anything about the middle one…
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November 20, 2016 at 10:46 am
Your historical survey is going to ramify alarmingly — post-Napoleon you run into LES MISERABLES (a dozen film adaptations, starting in 1909), then Louis Philippe brings you to Balzac, whose major works and characters ALL have sprawling international filmographies.
November 20, 2016 at 1:41 pm
…and – of course – Les Enfants du Paradis set in the 1820s and 30s…
November 20, 2016 at 8:29 pm
For Post-Napoleonic snow days go directly to Melville’s film of Cocteau’s Les Enfants Terrible
November 20, 2016 at 8:41 pm
If you understand French, Sacha Guitry made several films on the history of France: Le diable boiteux (1948), on the life of Talleyrand; Si Versailles m’était conté (1954), a history of the palace of Versailles; Napoleon (1955), a biopic as recounted by Talleyrand; and Si Paris nous était conté (1956), a history of Paris from Caesar to 1955. Alas, none are available with subtitles (there are dubbed, butchered versions) but all sound delicious.
November 20, 2016 at 10:39 pm
Primo historical Guitry, and subtitled — REMONTONS LES CHAMPS ELYSEES.
November 21, 2016 at 1:41 am
Thanks!
The Versailles film is particularly appealing for Claudette Colbert and Orson Welles being in it (along with Barrault, Marais, Phlippe, Presle…)!