WORLD TOUR Day 39 - Paris, France
BEFORE: I'm deep in the middle of New York Comic-Con, and I'd planned to watch this one on Thursday before the madness started - then I realized I had to get up very early on Thursday to drive over to the convention in a van with all our merchandise, so a movie was out of the question. I've been getting up early for the last three days to be in place at the booth before it opens, but I snuck this film in so that I'd stay on track, by watching 1/2 on Friday night and 1/2 on Saturday night.
I finally made it to Paris, with just 25 movies to go, and I'll be here for a few days, so after this city, I've really got to get a move on. Linking from "Girl with a Pearl Earring", Colin Firth was also in "Nanny McPhee" with Angela Lansbury, who was also in "A Breath of Scandal" with Maurice Chevalier.
THE PLOT: Weary of the conventions of Parisian society, a rich playboy and a youthful courtesan-in-training enjoy a platonic friendship, but it may not stay platonic for long.
AFTER: This is not really my kind of movie, but it did win the Oscar for Best Picture of 1958, so that means a look is warranted, at the very least. I remember my Mom likes this film, though honestly I can't see why.
The French men are so snooty, and hypocritical since they seem to act so refined, yet also fairly perverted since they're practicing what we now call casual sex, and this is back in the 1950's. Perhaps the French were ahead of their time, I don't know. But a courtesan was essentially a bought mistress, a kept woman, who a rich Frenchman would (apparently) supply with a house, car, servants, all so she could be well cared for, and ready to service him upon demand. It all seems a little disgusting.
The title character is being raised by her aunt, given music lessons and being taught the ways of proper behavior, all so that one day she can catch the eye of a rich Frenchman and be provided for. Pimped out, I say. Her aunt and mother have those annoying, snooty, nasal and high-pitched prim accents - which didn't really sound French, they sounded like high British to me.
Gaston, who finds simply everything in his sheltered, high-profile lifestyle to be "a bore", takes the young girl (Leslie Caron was 27 years old, playing a girl of what, 15?) on innocent day trips, but eventually comes to regard her as a woman, and one that he has feelings for. But he finds it hard to integrate her into his life of societal functions, even with the etiquette lessons. But hey, at least she's not boring.
I just want to cross this one off the list, get some sleep, and get back to a convention center full of sci-fi geeks in costume, where things somehow make more sense.
Also starring Leslie Caron, Louis Jourdan, Hermione Gingold, Eva Gabor.
DISTANCE TRAVELED TODAY: 234 miles / 378 km (Delft, Netherlands to Paris, France)
DISTANCE TRAVELED SO FAR: 12,044 miles / 19,391 km
RATING: 3 out of 10 emeralds
"It's about this underage girl who's being trained for a career as a romantic plaything for wealthy men, against her will. One of these wealthy men cultivates a sort of older brother/kid sister relationship with her, which he then converts into something more boudoir-oriented."
ReplyDeleteThat's kind of the story, right?
(I know, I know: and "Run For Your Life" is a Beatles song in which a man reminds his girlfriend that he owns her totally, and that any deviation from their relationship as he expects it to be will result in her murder at his own hand.")
Right, essentially it's "Pretty Woman", only made 30 years earlier, set 80 (?) years earlier, and set in Paris.
DeleteI think it's weird because the conventional type of relationship is also the twist. We're led to believe that a teenage girl raised to be a high-class prostitute (let's call it what it is) is the norm, and that this stubborn girl will somehow come around and accept her station in life.
The fact that this wealthy man shows an interest in her doesn't seem odd until her aunt and mother suddenly realize that she's of age, and once they believe that the man's interest could be sexual, they demand that he set her up with a house, car, servants, etc.
All seems perfectly natural, until the unexpected happens, and they realize they have feelings for each other. So where in most films you have the complexities of a relationship getting in the way of love, here you have love getting in the way of a business-like relationship arrangement.
Still, big whoop.