1937 - UN CARNET DU BAL aka Life Dances On.

This drama about a woman trying to make sense of her life after her husband dies is considered a film classic.  It's a part of the traditional French main stream film industry that was to be eviscerated by Francois Truffaut, Eric Rohmer, Godard and the rest of the "New Wave" gang looking to make a name for themselves by attacking traditional film directors in the 1950's and 60's.

However Julien Duvivier the director who was making films in the 1930's was a superb director and had an understanding of how to use the camera to tell a story.  You could probably put Duvivier's filmography next to any of the "New Wave" directors and it would more than hold it's own.

Duvivier spent some time in Hollywood during World War II where he had a mixed career.  The interesting Flesh and Fantasy and Lydia used the same episodic story telling structure as Un Carnet Du Bal.  However the ridiculous The Great Waltz which was supposedly based on the life of Johann Strauss II The Waltz King and probably one of the silliest films ever made about a composer.

  

Un Carnet Du Bal is one of his best films.  Duvivier and his writers fashioned a story that revolves around a woman remembering her coming out ball when she was sixteen years old where she was pursued by seven suitors.  She decides to find out what happened to each of these men and begins a journey to locate them.  From the beginning of the film with it's impressive memory waltz scene of her first dance to her final realization of the reality of her life, the film is actually quite a moving portrait of one woman.  

This is certainly a high point of 1930's French film making and cinema. 

The film was written by Julien Duvivier, Henri Jeanson, Yves Mirande, Jean Sarment, Pierre Wolff, and Bernard Zimmer.  The running time is 144 minutes.

1938 - THE GREAT WALTZ, you have to see it to believe it.

MGM who made their money with middle brow musicals, dramas, and comedies would occasionally decide that what the movie going public wanted was high brow classical entertainment.  The Great Waltz certainly fits this description.  It's an indescribable musical drama about the life of Johann Strauss II a composer known as "The Waltz King."  One quick look at his Wikipedia page shows that not one scene in this film dramatizes the life of Strauss.  In MGM's favor they do announce with a title card at the beginning of the film that this will not be based on the life of Strauss.

MGM spared no expense making this film, the sets are elaborate, the writers are some of the best, the cinematography is at a high caliber.  Oscar Hammerstein of Rogers and Hammerstein fame was hired to add lyrics to the Strauss compositions like they needed lyrics.  Film composer Dimitri Tiomkin rearranged the Strauss waltzes like that needed to be done as well.  The director was Julien Duvivier one of the masters of French cinema.  Duvivier was a man of intelligence and taste so it's rather amazing to see him involved in something like.  The production was so big that Victor Fleming and Josef von Sternberg filmed scenes for the movie although they are uncredited.

 

In order to give the film some class MGM hired a couple of European actors Fernand Gravet and most importantly Miliza Korjus a soprano from Poland.  Since no one could pronounce Korjus name the MGM publicity department hilariously trumped in their advertising that Korjus rhymed with "gorgeous."  Korjus sings and sings and sings trilling her way through one Strauss composition after another, it's exhausting.

 

For all the silliness of this film and it is a very silly love triangle story,  there is a certain amount of style in many of the scenes.  One suspects Duvivier did what he could to at least film a few good scenes in this hodge podge of Viennese waltz madness.

The film was written by a could of decent writers,  Samuel Hoffenstein and Walter Reisch but there was only so much they could do with this gooey mess of drama and high brow music.  Unsurprisingly the film did not make money. The running time is 104 minutes.

1943 - FLESH AND FANTASY - excellent 1940's anthology film

The actor Charles Boyer and the director Julien Duvivier teamed up to produce this fantasy film for Universal Studios kind of the home for these kind of films.  Duvivier was a French filmmaker who left France during World War II and settled in Hollywood for a while working for the Hollywood studio system.  Duvivier was also a superb director.

The film consists of three stories about a half and hour each and frankly time has worn a bit on the stories themselves.  Shows like The Twilight Zone and Night Gallery have kind of reused this material over and over.

However what hasn't aged in this film are the performances of an excellent cast with actors like Charles Boyer, Edward G. Robinson, Thomas Mitchell, Robert Benchley (playing Robert Benchley as usual). Barbara Stanwyck and Betty Field.  Also to be commended is Duvivier's technique behind the camera who along with his production team put together a film that shows a real command of the film medium, this film is a pleasure to watch.

The writers were Ellis St. Joseph, Oscar Wilde, László Vadnay, Ernest Pascal and Samuel Hoffenstein.  The running time is 94 minutes.