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Gervaise

1956, Movie, NR, 120 mins

Gervaise: Review

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Based on a Zola novel about the evils of alcoholism, Rene Clement's film shifts the emphasis from a study of life in a gin-house to the downward spiral of one of its poverty-stricken characters, Gervaise (Maria Schell). The time is the 1850s, the location is the poorest section of Montmartre in Paris. Only 18 years old, Gervaise already has two children by her lover, Lantier (Armand Mestral), who leaves her. She goes to a local bathhouse and learns that he has fled with Virginie (Suzy Delair), the sister of a neighbor. Some time later, Gervaise marries the kind and gentle Coupeau (Francois Perier), with whom she has a daughter, and life finally seems to have a glimmer of hope. But while Gervaise is saving money so she can open her own laundry, Coupeau suffers an accident and is incapacitated for many months, which drains Gervaise's savings. A friendly blacksmith, Goujet (Jacques Harden), offers Gervaise the money to open her laundry, and it's not too hard to see that he is madly in love with her. As Gervaise finally opens her shop, Virginie reappears. This film, one of Clement's best, came at a time when the director was falling out of critical favor as a result of brutal attacks from the writers of Cahiers du Cinema. In spite of this, GERVAISE won numerous awards, including Best Actress (Schell) and Best Film at the Venice Film Festival and an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Film. In French with English subtitles. leave a comment
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