Quai des Orfevres - Criterion Collection Henri-Georges Clouzot Digital Life DVD

Quai des Orfevres - Criterion Collection
starring: Suzy Delair, Bernard Blier, Louis Jouvet, Simone Renant, Pierre Larquey
directed by: Henri-Georges Clouzot

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Collectible Price: $77.77
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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: Unrated
Binding: DVD
EAN: 9780780026551
Format: Black & White, DVD-Video, Subtitled, NTSC
ISBN: 0780026551
Label: Criterion
Manufacturer: Criterion
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Criterion
Region Code: 1
Release Date: May 27, 2003
Running Time: 106 minutes
Sales Rank: 43687
Studio: Criterion
Theatrical Release Date: March 05, 1948

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Description:
Blacklisted for his daring 'anti-French' masterpiece, Le Corbeau, Henri-Georges Clouzot returned to cinema four years later with the 1947 crime fiction adaptation, Quai des Orfevres. Set within the vibrant dancehalls and historic crime corridors of 1940s Paris, ambitious performer Jenny Lamour (Suzy Delair), her covetous piano-playing husband Maurice Martineau (Bertrand Blier), and their devoted confidante Dora Monier (Simone Renant) attempt to cover one another’s tracks when a sexually ogreish high-society acquaintance is murdered. Enter Inspector Antoine (Louis Jouvet), whose seasoned instincts lead him down a circuitous path in this classic whodunit murder mystery.

Amazon.com:
Though dressed in the guise of a murder mystery, Quai des Orfèvres is a rich, engrossing character study in which murder plays a secondary role. Six years before the triumph of The Wages of Fear, director Henri-Georges Clouzot couldn't find a copy of his source novel (Légitime Defense, by Stanislas-André Steeman), so he crafted this stylish police procedural from spotty memory, infuriating the author while freeing himself to explore the depths of his all-too-human characters. Using atmospheric Parisian locations and shadowy compositions that rival anything in American film noir, Clouzot gives plausible alibis to the prime suspects--a dancehall chanteuse, her suspicious husband, and a fashionable lesbian photographer--while a seasoned detective (played to perfection by Louis Jouvet) efficiently sorts through the clues. Anyone expecting thrills will be disappointed: Clouzot's fascination with human behavior prevails, and this subtle mix of motives and secrets is delicately balanced with underworld cynicism and a compassionate understanding of the human heart. --Jeff Shannon

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Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- The low life
Henri-Georges Clouzot's 1948 police procedural, also exhibited under the title JENNY LAMOUR, is a beautifully constructed look into the lives of the lower depths of Paris just after the war, where millionaires go slumming and rub elbows with pornographers, petty thieves, and vaudeville performers. As with his later LES DIABOLIQUES, Clouzot focuses mainly on an odd little ménage á troi: Jenny Lamour (the astonishingly carnal Suzy Delair), a music-hall songstress and femme fatale; her nebbishy husband and accompanist Maurice Martineau (Bernard Blier, looking like Bob Newhart); and Dora Monier (Simone Renant), their photographer friend who dabbles in pornography and who yearns for Jenny (but sleeps with Maurice). All three of them one night secretly visit the crime scene of a murder of the loathsome elderly capitalist (Charles Dullin) who makes advances towards Jenny: the film shows you how they attempt to cover their ... Read More

Rating:

- A great comeback of H.G. Cluozot
H.G. Cluozot had difficulties working in France after he had made "Le Corbeau" in 1943 which was produced by the German company and later judged by French as a piece of anti-French propaganda. Louis Jouvet, an admirer of Clouzot's work, invited him to direct a thriller "Quai des Orfevres" where he played an ambiguous police inspector investigating a murder that happened in Paris Music Hall. Without each other knowledge, the seductive cabaret singer Jenny Lamoure (Suzy Delair) and her jealous piano-accompanist husband Maurice who is madly in love with her (Bertrand Blier, father of director Bertrand Blier) trying to cover up (without each other's knowledge) what they believe to be their involvement in the murder? Enters tenacious policeman (Louis Jouvet) who is determined to discover the truth. Jouvet practically stole the movie with wonderfully cynic and sentimental in the same time performance. "His character, his eagle ... Read More

Rating:

- Quai des Orfevres
This smart, atmospheric policier marked Clouzot's return to filmmaking after the putatively anti-French "Le Corbeau." Blier and Delair are magnetic performers, and clearly relish their roles as a husband and wife under investigation by crafty Inspector Antoine (the marvelous Louis Jouvet), a man with a nose for human foibles. Clouzot handles the noir conventions with a deft touch, but focuses on developing his characters--including raven-haired beauty Simone Renant, playing Jenny's bosom friend and closet lesbian, Dora. (Best line: "I'm a funny kind of girl.") If you like your noir with a classy French twist, check out "Quai des Orfevres."

Rating:

- A marvelous, amusing movie about murder, jealousy, music halls and love, with enough raisins even for Hitchcock
Is it a murder mystery? Is it a police procedural? Is it a back-stage look at seedy French music halls? Quai des Orfevres is all of these, but more than anything else it's an amusing comedy of infidelity, jealousy and love, set in post-WWII Paris. It may be surprising that Henri-Georges Clouzot, the director of such grim films as Le Corbeau or such suspenseful nail-biters as Diabolique and The Wages of Fear, is the director of this one. Clouzot, however, was a shrewd film-maker. "In a murder mystery," he tells us, 'there's an element of playfulness. It's never totally realistic. In this I share Hitchcock's view, which says, 'A murder mystery is a slice of cake with raisins and candied fruit, and if you deny yourself this, you might as well film a documentary.'" Quai des Orfevres is a wonderful film, and it's no documentary.

Jenny Martineau (Suzy Delair) is an ambitious singer at music halls and supper clubs. ... Read More

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