"French Religious Nutcase Noir" (Noirsville)
Written by Jeff Musso and Liam O'Flaherty and based on Liam O'Flaherty's novel (originally set in Ireland), with adaptation work also done by Jannine Delpech and Louis Postif.
The Cinematography was by Charles Bauer and Curt Courant. Music was by Jacques Belasco and Jeff Musso.
The film Stars Jean-Louis Barrault as Francis Ferriter, Pierre Fresnay as Le commissaire Lavan, Viviane Romance as Molly, Alla Donell as Thérésa Burke, Louis-Jacques Boucot as Monsieur Kelly, Mady Berry as Madame Kelly, Alexandre Rignault as Le docteur O'Leary, Fréhel Ludmilla Pitoëff as La tante de Thérésa.
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| Jean-Louis Barrault as Francis Ferriter |
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| Viviane Romance as Molly |
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| Pierre Fresnay as Le commissaire Lavan |
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| Le commissaire Lavan lt., with Alexandre Rignault as Le docteur O'Leary rt. |
When Charles O’Brien researched the use of “film noir” before WWII in "Film Noir In France: Before The Liberation." He documented how that term was used in the religious and right wing publications of Paris during the 1930s. One of the nine (there may be more), Film Noir he discovered during the course of his research was Le puritain. However at the writing of his essay he had not been able to find a copy to watch.
I find it sort of humorous and quite coincidental that I recently reviewed Crimes of Passion (1984) which is surprisingly very similar in it's basic storyline.
Note bene, Liam O'Flaherty's novel was originally set in Ireland if any are curious about the Irish names of some of the characters.
Story
"One night, in a town....."
Francis Ferriter is a journalist for a French religious publication. He's also a religious fanatic who belongs to a sort of vigilante committee warring against the decay of morals in 1930s France. He lives in the garret of Kelly's apartment house. He believes he's doing Gods work by casting out, and striking down Satan and his disciples.
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We drop into the story after Francis "Le puritain" has fallen in love with Thérésa Burke a prostitute who lives on one of the floors below the garret. She's an object of his desire, but it's either the conflicts with his beliefs or his own sexual inadequacies, or both, that drive him insane.
Francis is prepping himself. He knocks on the door of Fitzpatrick an insurance salesman and a fellow resident to borrow a cigarette and ask for the time. He then goes back to the room put on gloves, also a robe, and places a folded piece of paper upon his desk.
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He sneaks down the stairway and waits. Thérésa's door opens and Michael O'Leary a "gentleman caller" comes out to the hall.
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They kiss at the door and then O'Leary asks for another as Thérésa walks him down the hall towards the outside door.
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Francis sneaks down the passage and enters Thérésa apartment waiting for her return. When Thérésa returns Francis stabs her in the back. Thérésa falls dead. Francis looking at her dead body and seeing that her legs are exposed pauses, before he leaves, to pull her robe over them, still doing gods work.
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No one heard the act, he wasn't caught and he sneaks back up to his room. In Francis' mind the murder is a manifestation of divine justice.
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Thérésa is found dead in the morning by another tenant and the landlady. Everyone in the apartment house is questioned by Le commissaire Lavan of the police.
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| Police questioning Francis |
The police zero in on Thérésa's last customer Dr. Michael O'Leary helped by Francis who claims he saw him leave the house late last night from his window, which gives Francis a bit of breathing room.
However Francis' fanatical declarations with demands of public exposure to those deemed guilty, and his feelings of guilt begin to build overwhelmingly and once the police discover that the back door was locked from the inside they put a tail on him, and it all goes Noirsville.
Noirsville
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A classic French Noir of a decent into madness. Could use a restoration. 7/10
From William Aherns's "The Death of Film Noir" and Charles O'Brien's " Film Noir In France: Before The Liberation"
Pauline Kael remarked in her review:
“Jean-Louis Barrault was [. . .] perfect for Liam O'Flaherty's psychological study of the murderer Ferriter,” wrote Kael, “a righteous reformer and sexually obsessed religious fanatic. Barrault's acting was so unusually objective that one respected this poor devil even at his most hopelessly self-deceived. [“Le Puritan”], condemned by New York's State Board of Censors in toto as ‘indecent, immoral, sacrilegious, tending to incite to crime and corrupt morals,’ is in perfectly good taste, but the censors had a reason for their stand: Ferriter is not only conceived as a censor type, he's actually engaged in this work in the film.”
The New York State Board of Censors would feel right at home reading the film criticism in some of the Paris newspapers. Writing in Action française in January 1938, the critic Francois Vinneuil called “Le Puritan” “a classic subject: the film noir, plunging into debauchery and crime.”
O’Brien notes that “It is appropriate that Vinneuil should refer to Le Puritain as a film noir because the film’s protagonist, played with theatricality by Barrault, is a young editorialist for the daily L’Etoile du matin whose denunciations of ‘foreign filth and atheist propaganda’ are so excessive that the paper’s editor fires him. Among the most prominent film critics of the [pre-war era], Vinneuil employed the term film noir in reviews that contributed to an evolving debate on the issues of film realism.”
Superlative Barrault
dbdumonteil27 September 2009
The cast and credits which appear at the beginning of the film are bizarre:Pierre Fresnay and Viviane Romance (it takes 50 minutes before the latter appears and her screen presence does not exceed 20 min)are at the top of the bill though they play supporting parts whereas Jean-Louis Barrault who carries the movie upon his shoulders and is present in 95% of the scenes is credited as "supporting".
"Le Puritain " was extremely different from all that was done at the time in France (and French cinema at the time reached peaks which it never surpassed afterward) .Telling the story of a religious fanatic who kills a good time gal because he thinks he has become God's instrument;someone who seems to hate the whole world ,who compares the heathen town to Sodom.It's one of Jean-Louis Barrault's most stunning performances (it might well be his very best ,if we do not count "Les Enfants Du Paradis" considered the best French movie of all time).His feverish look,his total mastery of his art ,from a whisper to a scream (And I mean "scream " for he cries like one possessed )are really awesome.The movie won the Prix Louis Delluc .
Based on a novel by Liam O' Flaherty,the story is supposed to take place in Ireland and it does in the movie although the atmosphere is not really Irish:the Concierge is typically French,and the music you can hear in the low dive is a tango to the tune of an accordion.And Pierre Fresnay is Commissaire Wens one year before he portrays this character.
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