While recently searching for lesser known European fairy-tale films
to discover and watch, I came across this 1951 effort by French
director Marcel Carne. It appeared to be a neglected film with not a
lot being written about it, and relatively few people having seen it.
However, just looking at the stills that I was able to find from the
film, I knew that it was one that I had to see and I was fairly
certain that it was going to appeal to me, as it seemed to have a
visual quality that was similar to Jean Cocteau's sublime “La Belle
et la Bete” (the gold star of all fairy-tale films). Whilst it
took me a little while to finally track down a copy of the film to
watch, I am happy to report that I was successful in my search, but
did the film live up to my “fairy-tale” expectations, lets take a
look, shall we?
Michel lies awake and restless in his prison cell, haunted by the
memory of his lost love Juliette, when his cellmate turns to him and
tells him to escape his current situation via his dreams and to find
freedom within them. Soon after, Michel awakens to find the door of
his cell to be wide open and the sunlight from outside bursting
through, inviting him to venture beyond the boundaries of his
incarceration. Michel leaves the prison in search of Juliette, and
soon comes across a small village. When he asks a nearby stranger
the name of the village, the man laughs and says “that is something
we would all like to know”, as Michel soon discovers that all the
inhabitants of this quaint town all have no memory of their past
lives. As one villager states “welcome to the city of lost
memories”. Determined to find Juliette, Michel asks anyone who
passes by him of news of his love, but is amused to find that either
they claim Juliette to be of their own (be it either their daughter,
wife or something else entirely), or they are the only person to know
of such a girl. He soon discovers that Juliette is in the village,
and continues searching for her within a beautiful forest.
Meanwhile, upon hearing that a young man is searching for a beautiful
maiden, a villainous Count decides to use this information to his
advantage and pretend that it is he that is the one who is looking
for Juliette (for remember, Juliette herself has no memory of the man
who loves her), determined to claim her love for his own self. So
Michel soon finds himself in a story that involves a hero, a villain
and a quest to save a beautiful heroine, that is all situated in a
village filled with enchanting forests and terrifying castles; Michel
has found himself in the centre of a fairy-tale It all seems like a
bizarre dream, but no one can dream forever.
When it comes to the career of Marcel Carne, most people remember him
for the stunning sequence of films that he made between the years of
1936 (starting with “Jenny”) and 1946 (ending with “Les Portes
de la Nuit”), in collaboration with writer Jacques Prevert.
Between the two of them, they essentially pioneered the “poetic
realism” movement of French cinema during this time. With bonafide
classics like “Port of Shadows” (1938) and “Children of
Paradise” (1945) to his name, Marcel Carne was once considered one
of the great directors of French cinema, however his post-war output
is rarely greeted with the same acclaim or reverence. “Juliette, or
Key of Dreams” was the second film Carne made post-war, and
personally I feel that it has been unjustly ignored in regards to the
great films made by this fine director.
Interestingly,
the way that “Juliette, or Key of Dreams” opens is almost like a
nod to the poetic realism films of Carne's past, as it is set very
much in the real world, with Michel (who is very obviously a
proletariat worker)
set for a future that appears dark and depressing. Visually, it is
the same too, with the cell that he lives in being one with minimal
light and the atmosphere within it to be one with little hope.
However that all changes once Michel's cellmate tells him to escape
through his dreams, as then the film becomes beautiful and bright,
filled with light and space, and the anticipation of a future filled
with optimism. The film looks exactly like a beautiful fairy-tale,
with the depth of field quite incredible. However it is when
Juliette first enters the film that you really sit up and take
notice. She looks like the perfect princess, and you are instantly
reminded of Belle in Cocteau's “La Belle et la Bete”. In fact
the similarities between that film, and the dream segment of
“Juliette, or Key of Dreams”, are hard to ignore, at least from a
visual perspective. No doubt this is deliberate too, as Carne uses
Henri Alekan as his cinematographer on this film, who also had the
same duties on the Cocteau masterpiece. Alekan does an expert job of
creating a sense of magic and whimsy via the visuals, and when the
film does get a little darker, like when the figure of Bluebeard is
introduced to the story, he finds interesting angles to shot from and
uses shadows to give the picture a menace that didn't exist prior. I
should also mention, that Alekan does an excellent job at
differentiating between the scenes set in reality and those in the
dreamworld. The real world scenes are all lit very darkly, and give
a feeling of hopelessness and oppression; the complete opposite
feeling that we feel in the fairy-tale dream.
What I loved so much about “Juliette, or Key of Dreams” is the
imagination of it all especially during the scenes set in the City of
Lost Memories. Because everyone in the village has no memories of
their own, they will do anything to possess someone else's memories
and claim them as theirs. The first instance of this is actually
when Michel is walking past a woman and she exclaims “so you
finally come home then!”, to which he replies “you are mistaken
madam, this is my first time here”, and she follows up with “oh,
I guess you aren't my husband then”. When Michel asks if anyone
knows where Juliette is, the name of the girl starts a pandemic of
false memories amongst the villagers with one person claiming she is
his daughter, another his wife, whilst another says she is a name on
a tombstone he visits daily, whilst another still claims it is a
variety of rose that he sells. However what impressed me so much was
the fortune teller who only tells people of their pasts (never their
future), and the travelling salesman who offers souvenirs from
holidays never taken, or mementos of moments that never happened,
like for instance, a handkerchief stained with tears after a sad
goodbye. What I found so interesting was that these characters did
not care if the memory was really theirs, as long as they had a
memory to hold onto, so they did not feel lost.
One thing that I should quickly mention is the fact that it is no
spoiler that Michel is dreaming. It is not some third act twist
where we find out that everything we have watched previous was only a
dream, rather Carne sets it up right from the beginning so the viewer
is not left confused that what is going on during the fairy-tale is
anything but real. That said, the fairy-tale leaves clues throughout
it about Michel's predicament in real life. The film has an odd
structure in that the first ten or so minutes are set in reality,
with the following hour then in the dreamworld, before we return to
reality for the final fifteen minutes. It is during these final
fifteen minutes where we see the truth of Michel's situation and why
he so much wants to stay in that dream. Similar to “The Wizard of
Oz”, once Michel awakens, we see a number of characters from his
dream wearing a different visage in real life. But it also
highlights just how different Michel's dream is from his reality as
the one thing he wants more than anything in his life, is impossible
to get. In fact, it gets even worse than he could imagine after he
has woken up, to the point that Michel will do anything to find his
way back into his dream, but no one can dream forever; you eventually
have to wake up and face reality head-on. I must admit that I was
initially shocked by the ending of the film which, from my reading of
it, was very cynical and pessimistic. After spending the majority of
the film in a fairy-tale consciousness, I kind of expected a happy
ending, but after consideration and contemplation after the fact, I
came to the conclusion that this is the right ending for the story
and that it actually works extremely well too. I also felt a little
foolish in my initial shock, as if taken in the context of Marcel
Carne's “poetic realism” films (which I am sure the bookends of
this film are meant to resemble), there could almost be no other
ending than a tragic one.
Overall, whilst this was not a “true” fairy-tale film like I was
initially expecting, I ended up liking “Juliette, or Key of Dreams”
a great deal. Visually the film is outstanding, and feels close to
the splendour of Cocteau's “La Belle et la Bete”. Ironically, in
regards to me wanting the film to be closer to a real fairy-tale, I
felt the inclusion of elements from the Bluebeard fairy-tale to be a
little ham-fisted and didn't work as well as if they came up with
their own villain of the piece. Other than that, I found the film a
delight and after some initial shock, I also liked the film's cynical
ending. While not a masterpiece from director Marcel Carne, it is a
film that has been unjustly ignored, and I hope it gets rediscovered
in the near future, as more people really need to see this very good
film.
3.5 Stars.
