L’Atalante, Jean Vigo. “Cinema is an entirely new art not yet so much as 100 years old” wollen.
In recent years it is getting the recognition it deserves and is appreciated as much as literature, painting and theatre. This was not always the case. Film making had to start somewhere and French filmmakers of the 1930’s made many giant leaps in creating a new and beautiful art form. “Lumirere and melies achieved almost within our lifetime what Orphelus and Tubal-Cain have been revered for throughout the millennia, the mythical founders of the art of music, ancient, remote and inspiring” wollen. Jean Vigo was a very influential 1930’s director. He introduced emphasis on technique and gesture “la gueste.” He felt film was too literary and there was too much adaptation of literary works according to Dr Michael O’Dwyer. This is reflected in L’Atalante, 1934. This is a romance which contains some surrealism. The aspect of the film that most interested me was the innovative way in which he could turn a mundane situation into a “poetic vision”. Vigo was 29 when he died in 1934 but this film helped to establish him as an influential director. It tells the story of a newly wedded couple. Jean (Jean Dasté, who stared in Renoir''s Grand Illusion) and Juliette (Dita Parlo, also featured in Grand Illusion) are too spend their honey moon in a rundown boat travelling up the seine. They are accompanied by “Jean''s slovenly second mate Jules” who is in my opinion the most interesting character (Michel Simon) and Jules'' son (Louis Lefebvre). This film also features beautiful cinematography with some great shots in stunning black and white. “The images are often haunting and mesmerizing even when they are of typically "ugly" things like an industrial wasteland next to a canal.” http://www.nicksflickpicks.com/atalante.html. I feel this contrast between beautiful images and disturbing distasteful ones mirror the turbulent relationship between the hero and heroine. The director is resourceful with the technology of the time and does not overload the film with action scenes so that the audience can have time to reflect on the meaning of the film. « Ce que je cherche, c''est la raison cachée d''une geste. Je veux extraire à une chose banale, ça une variété d''éclairage. » Vigo assembles many different elements on the set to obtain an effect of reality. With this film the gestures and lighting tell a story of their own and it is possible to read between the lines. The viewer could almost be on board the ship. The film does not seem to fit into the realist or surreal fantasy genre. It combines strange and beautiful imagery with a growing number of cats in every scene which adds a touch of refreshing humour.