Director: Max Ophuls
Starring: Danielle Darrieux, Charles Boyer, Vittorio De Sica
Studio: Gaumont/The Criterion Collection 445
Video: 1:33 B&W
Audio: French DD mono
Subtitles: English
Extras: Audio commentary by film scholars Susan White & Gaylyn Studlar; Introduction with clips from film by filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson; Interviews with collaborators Alain Jessua, Marc Frederix, and Annette Wademant; Visual analysis of the film by film scholar Tag Gallagher; Interview with novelist Louise de Vilmorin on Ophuls’ adaptation of her story; Improved English subtitles; 78-page illustrated booklet with new essay by Molly Haskell, excerpt from costume designer Georges Annenkov’s book on Ophuls, and the source novel, Madame de, by Vilmorin.
Length: 100 minutes
Rating: ****(*)
This is the crowning work of the German-born French director Max Ophuls and raised by its fans to the status of Citizen Kane and Modern Times. Those of us not heavily into elliptical moral tales of French aristocracy may disagree, but there is no doubt that The Earrings of Madame de… brings together three superb actors at the height of their careers, glorious sets and costumes, a very clever plot, and Ophuls’ advanced moving camerawork – which seems to glide thru the film focusing on exactly the details he wants the viewer to grasp.
In one way the story line is similar to Ophuls’ earlier La Ronde, only this time instead of a ring passing from one person to another it is a pair of earrings and a more closed group of people involved. It begins in the period around 1900 with a frivolous beautiful woman, who has a reputation as a flirt, secretly pawning the expensive earrings her military general husband had given her as a wedding present. She has to cover some debts caused by her extravagance. She then meets a baron who quickly falls in love with her, and she eventually follows suit. The two are shown dancing frequently at opulent balls in the company of her husband, who seems on good terms with the baron at first, although he is aware of his wife’s many “suitors.” (Filmmaker Anderson in his introduction to the film opines that he doesn’t think the wife and the baron progress beyond hugging and kissing. Hah! They’re wealthy, have time on their hands, and they’re French!) You’ll have to watch the film to learn how the baron ends up purchasing the same earrings to give to the wife again. To report that the chain reaction set off by Madame originally pawning the earrings brings all three characters to a despairing end cannot be considered a spoiler.
Criterion’s transfer preserves beautifully the advanced cinematic approach used by Ophuls, and the many special edition extras fill in many different aspects of the film’s background and the working processes of the director. Another lavish edition from Criterion.
– John Sunier
