From the director of Les Enfants Du Paradis QUAI DES BRUMES & LE JOUR SE LEVE Directed by Marcel CarneOUT TO OWN AS INDIVIDUAL TITLES ON DVD 30 April 2007 UK DVD PREMIERESMarcel Carné began his filmmaking career as an assistant to Jacques Feyder (La Kermesse héroïque, La Noi du Nord) before directing his first film Jenny at the age of 25 in 1936. Collaborating regularly with a trusted circle of like-minded artists, including the actor Jean Gabin and screenwriter Jacques Prevert, Carné soon made his name as the greatest of France’s pre-war poetic realist filmmakers. Working within the government of Vichy in occupied France during the war, Carné produced the anti-Nazi parable and all-time classic Les Enfants du Paradis (1945). Le Jour Se Leve and Quai des Brumes, both feted at the Venice Film Festival, are also both UK DVD premieres, the latter also being presented in a fully re-mastered version.QUAI DES BRUMES (1938)“This gritty and poetic piece of work will remain one of the greatest cinematographic pieces ever made: a kind of peak in cinema which Marc Orlan described as ‘the social extraordinary’.” R. Boussinot, The Encyclopedia of Cinema
Jean (Jean Gabin), a deserter, arrives in Le Havre and looks for a shelter before planning his escape from French territory. Housed in a shed on the harbour at the end of the docks, he meets an eccentric painter (Michel Simon), a mysterious and beautiful girl called Nelly (Michèle Morgan) and a small dog… all of whom will shape his destiny in one tragic way or another.
LE JOUR SE LEVE (1939)
“A Model of French Poetic Realism” **** Halliwell’s Film Guide
Francois (Jean Gabin) sits locked in his room, a gun in his hand, having just committed the murder. As he contemplates his fate, he reflects as to how events conspired to bring his life to this conclusion – starting with falling in love with a young florist whose attentions are soon distracted by the arrival of a Machiavellian dog trainer Valentin….Quai Des Brumes And Le Jour Se Leve