It took me years to catch up with this classic and when I did so it was in a small Paris Art-House and, ironically, shown with English subtitles. I went with the knowledge that on its release it was a disaster in France - though Signoret picked up a Best Actress Award from England - where it was quickly yanked and not shown again for another nine years by which time Becker was on the menu and unable to bask in his vindication. It's difficult now to see what contemporary critics and audiences found to beef about. Becker did not so much shoot this film as paint it with delicate brush strokes - another irony as the story is in yer face. It was based on real characters and events of 1902 and maybe it was Becker's painstaking re-creation of an era half a century away that disturbed. Signoret was at the height of her passionate romance with Yves Montand and this shows in every frame in which she appears and who wouldn't have swapped places with Serge Reggiani (a close friend of both Signoret and Montand - he had played opposite Montand in Les Portes de la Nuit). Ever reliable Claude Dauphin completed the eternal triangle. When Pal Joey opened at the Ethel Barrymore Theater on Christmas Day, 1940, it was years ahead of its time, a musical in which every character was offensive in some way; though the score by Rodgers and Hart was vintage and grudgingly acknowledged to be so one pertinent critical comment read 'is it possible to draw sweet water from a foul well'. 12 years later, in 1952, the year Casque d'Or was savaged, Pal Joey was revived and became a major success. The story of Casque d'Or is arguably sordid and equally arguably a foul well yet Becker, via his lovingly detailed compositions and re-creation of the period DOES draw exceedingly sweet water from a foul well. Trivia question: What do Juliette Binoche and Simone Signoret have in common. Answer: Both watch their man (husband, Daniel Auteuil, lover, Serge Reggiani) executed at the end of the film. Patrice Leconte began 'La Veuve de St Pierre' brilliantly with a tracking shot featuring Binoche looking down at we know not what - only at the end do we realise she is watching Auteuil face a firing squad. Signoret's Marie also looks down on the scene as Reggiani is guillotined. In 2052 this one will still be great.
Review of Casque d'Or
