The Rules of the Game
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VHS Tape Cover Information
Actor: Eddy Debray, Julien Carette, Marcel Dalio, Paulette Dubost, Tony CorteggianiPrimary Contributor: Marcel Dalio
Primary Contributor: Nora Gregor
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Subtitled); French (Original Language), Analog
Format: Black & White, NTSC
Running Time: 110 minutes
Release Date: 2000-06-13
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Publisher: Homevision
Studio: Homevision
VHS Movie Reviews of The Rules of the Game
Movie Review: Good not great
Summary: 3 Stars
French filmmaker Jean Renoir's 1939 black and white classic, The Rules Of The Game (La R?gle Du Jeu), routinely shows up on Top Five lists for best films ever, along with classics like Orson Welles' Citizen Kane, Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai, and Yasujiro Ozu's Tokyo Story. But, it's not in a league with any of that tercet. In fact, while it's a good film, and a quite enjoyable one, it's not even close to being a great film. There are two basic reasons why: first is that, despite some kudos given by technical experts, the film is not nearly as visually compelling nor stunning as the Welles film, and its oft-claimed camera innovations and cinematography are not anything that wows a viewer. Of course, there are some interesting moments, and some of the nature photography is first rate, but anyone expecting to see the 1930s equivalent of The Matrix or 2001: A Space Odyssey, will be disappointed. This is, of course, not so much the fault of the film itself as it is the critics and champions who gush over every scene in the film. The second, and more important, reason this film fails to touch greatness is the manifest- its screenplay by Renoir and Carl Koch. While a slight twist, and improvement, on the screwball comedies of the day- by mixing it with the comedy of manners format (adapted from a 19th Century stage entry in that genre: Alfred de Musset's Les Caprices De Marianne, the film fails to develop a single compelling, sympathetic, or even remotely interesting character. In fact, the film fails to develop characters, period. They are all caricatures, which is not bad, in itself, if the film is solely intended as a satire. After all, is there a single realistic character in Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb? Unfortunately, The Rules Of The Games clearly tries and succeeds at being more than mere satire, and that little success is why the film's overall arch to greatness fails.
While The Rules Of The Game is certainly a film landmark, it is clearly not a great film. Its time has long since passed, on many levels, the least of which is its provincial ideas (note the casual bigotry in the `toy Negress' Robert plays with and the anti-Semitic caricatures the bourgeoisie portray in one of their musical numbers). In a sense, its overrating mirrors that of the novel The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, which, despite its flaws, has tireless champions who likewise, identify with the characters to such a degree that they are inoculated to any technical flaws within, much less the fact that they are that book's targets. To the rest of the audience, however, is left a solid comedy that tries a little too hard to be deep, instead of what it is- entertainment. Thus I repeat, and lament, where is the French Groucho when you need him?
Summary of The Rules of the Game
Infused with Jean Renoir's love for the outrageous, this remarkable film satirizes the erotic charades of the French leisure class as it teeters helplessly on the brink of World War II. Forsaking the humanism of his earlier films, Renoir mordantly satirizes the social and sexual mores of a decadent society near collapse. Forced off the screen by angry Parisians and later banned by the Nazis, Rules of the Game stands as one of Renoir's greatest artistic achievements.Consistently cited by critics worldwide as one of the greatest films ever made, Jean Renoir's bittersweet drama of life, love, class, and the social code of manners and behavior ("the rules of the game") is a savage critique undertaken with sensitivity and compassion. Renoir's catch-phrase through the film, "Everyone has their reasons," develops a multilayered meaning by the conclusion. A young aviator (Roland Toutain) commits a serious social faux pas by alluding to an affair on national radio. To avert a scandal, the cultured Robert de la Chesnaye (Marcel Dalio), husband to the aviator's mistress, Christine (Nora Gregor), and a philanderer in his own right, invites all to a weekend hunting party in his country mansion. The complicated maze of marriages and mistresses (social register and servant class alike) is plotted like a bedroom farce, but the tone soon takes a darker cast. Renoir, who also takes the pivotal role as Andre's jovial pal and de la Chesnaye confidant Octave, deftly blends high comedy with cutting satire as he parallels the upstairs-downstairs affairs. The film builds to a comic pitch with the hilarious performance of Julien Carette as a rabbit poacher turned groundskeeper, but soon turns tragic in a devastating conclusion. The film was roundly condemned and banned in France upon its 1939 release, but years later (out of the shadow of WWII) the film was rediscovered for the masterpiece that it is. --Sean Axmaker
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