• Les Enfants Terribles

7/21/22 (Thurs)

The masterful Le Samouraï made me curious to see more from Jean-Pierre Melville, so I picked this widely praised 1950 flick written by Jean Cocteau based on his novel. I had thought that this was based on the Cocteau play I saw years ago starring Kathleen Turner, but that turns out to have been a completely different work called Les Parents Terrible – apparently the writer doesn’t mind recycling titles (he made his own film of that work two years earlier in 1948). It’s hard to imagine anything further from Cocteau’s fantastical style than the austere approach shown in Melville’s later film, and I wondered how they would make that mesh. Not very well, it turns out.

The story is a bizarre telling of two siblings, a high school student Paul and his older sister Elisabeth, who depend on each other so closely that they practically share the same womb. They live a claustrophobic and near-incestuous existence (they share the same bath at one point) with certain codes in their behavior and dialogue that are familiar only to them. Their constant sniping, Paul’s stubbornness and Elisabeth’s badgering, which from the outside make them seem like bitter enemies, are all part of the game. Paul is infatuated with a pretty boy at school and keeps a photo of him (dressed in drag for a play) inside the “treasure chest” that he shares with his sister. When Elizabeth brings a colleague Agathe into their world, Paul is stunned at the remarkable resemblance with the boy (both roles are played by the same actress). He falls secretly in love with her – or for the boy she resembles. That sets off danger signals for Elisabeth, who wants her brother to herself. Unable to speak directly to Agathe despite living in the same house – and not realizing that she loves him desperately as well – Paul writes a letter confessing his feelings. Unfortunately that is intercepted by Elisabeth, and her subsequent actions lead in the end to tragedy.

The relations among all characters are entirely unnatural other than within the world created for them. It’s like a French version of Pinter. There are some strange developments even within the odd story. A scene where the pretty boy throws pepper in the teacher’s eye comes out of nowhere and should have stayed there, and the relationship with the rich man is not well set up or developed, though I did enjoy the nice jazz song sung at the piano (in a completely American accent, which threw me).

Still, the movie was certainly atmospherically staged. The opening snowball fight is nicely chaotic, while most of the other scenes feel appropriately claustrophobic even with the shift to the vast mansion inherited by Elisabeth. The death scene at the end was particularly impressive. The baroque look of the film is light years from the later Le Samouraï and hardly seems by the same director, which may reflect Cocteau’s influence. The two reportedly fought furiously during the filming, but Melville by most accounts is said basically to have made the film he wanted. In any event, the approach does fit the outrageous material.

Nicole Stéphane dominates the film in a powerhouse performance as Elisabeth. Edouard Dermithe as Paul is not nearly her match (he was apparently cast at the insistence of Cocteau, who was sleeping with him) and was far too old to be playing a high school kid. But he has the right look for the role, and choosing someone for the part who’s better-looking than the pretty boy he idealizes does change the dynamics in an interesting way. The dynamic cinematography and art design deserve mention as well. I wouldn’t say that I enjoyed the film, but it’s an experience for sure.