LA CHIENNE Movie Review

Isn't Life a Bitch?
The Bitch

Jean Renoir's first sound film is the tale of Maurice Legrand, an unhappily married bank teller (Michel Simon) who finds a bit of refuge from his harridan of a wife (Madeleine Bérubet) in the arms of an attractive street prostitute named Lulu (Janie Marèze).When Maurice discovers that Lulu and her lover/pimp, Dédé (Georges Flammand) have been setting him up, he kills her and lets Dédé take the rap. La Chienne (The Bitch), which is a masterful and deeply satisfying movie, has had a long and difficult time getting seen by the public. Though it was initially unsuccessful in its French release, due reputedly to the public's disappointment in discovering that Simon's role was not a comic one, Renoir wrote in his memoirs about a resourceful film distributor who saved the day. Instead of running ads featuring quotes from the best reviews, the distributor placed notices in papers advising that La Chienne was so horrifying that “families should stay away—it's not fit for sensitive viewers.” The film sold out that very night, and went on to great success, according to the director. One of La Chienne's most intriguing aspects is its exquisitely photographed portrait of life in the Montmartre section of Paris. We also hear the area's sounds, since Renoir insisted on natural sound recording techniques rather than post-synchronized dubbing, a process the director disdainfully called “equivalent to a belief in the duality of the soul.” It didn't get seen in America until the 1950s, and then it was with incomplete subtitles and a refusal to translate the title. La Chienne's basic story elements have been part of many movies since, but a faithful remake—Scarlet Street—was filmed in Hollywood in 1945 by Fritz Lang.

NEXT STOP … La Bete Humaine, The Crime of Monsieur Lange, The Woman in the Window

1931 93m/B FR Michel Simon, Janie Mareze, Georges Flament, Madeleine Berubet; D: Jean Renoir; W: Andre Girard, Jean Renoir. VHS, LV INT, TPV