"Coeur de Coq" played last night on TFO (Télévision française en Ontario), a local state-sponsored channel that revives a seemingly endless stream of forgotten and newly-restored French films. I admit I had never seen it. It is from a motley period of Fernandel's career where he kept experimenting with various genres and various distinguished directors, from Sacha Guitry's filmed theatre ("Tu m'as sauvé la vie", 1951) to Carlo Rim's experimental macabre comedy "L'Armoire volante" (1948), before his career was definitely given a boost by Julien's Duvivier's "Le Retour de Don Camillo", a comedy that definitely established him as a first-rate actor and a living legend.
Having been, perhaps luckily, ignored by the New Wave critics, he was unfortunately also passed over by overseas success, although the prestige of the Don Camillo movies made waves all the way to Italy, Germany and Soviet Russia and insured more and more substantial parts until the end of his life.
This little trifle is a made-to-measure musical comedy about a humble typesetter who sets his sight on the boss's daughter, who must marry a business associate of her father. A failed suicide attempt leads him to a mad scientist who decides to transplant a rooster's heart in the man, transforming him into a cocky seducer and superstud that must certainly have inspired Jerry Lewis's "Mister Love" in his "Nutty Professor".
The film is a mad hodge-podge of sentimental comedy, science fiction satire, dream-like escapades into a back-lot Venice, dancing girls, fantasy and whimsy, all neatly tied up into a traditional happy-end.
It was almost traditional for Fernandel comedies, by this time, for him to get the girl at the end, but this one goes one step further by presenting him as an irresistible Casanova, which his success had probably made him in real life, whether he liked it or not. The effect is most liberating as Fernandel's seductive powers have always been immense.
The film is not a masterpiece by a long shot, but it does not have a single tepid moment and goes merrily along its happy way in a somewhat dated but characteristic fashion. And Fernandel can always be counted on to deliver the charm, the musicianship, the humour, the wit and the laughs (with a special accolade to the mysterious Robert Rouzeaud - whom I suspect is a pseudonym for Paul Azaïs in a double role - as his Italian Mephisto).
Having been, perhaps luckily, ignored by the New Wave critics, he was unfortunately also passed over by overseas success, although the prestige of the Don Camillo movies made waves all the way to Italy, Germany and Soviet Russia and insured more and more substantial parts until the end of his life.
This little trifle is a made-to-measure musical comedy about a humble typesetter who sets his sight on the boss's daughter, who must marry a business associate of her father. A failed suicide attempt leads him to a mad scientist who decides to transplant a rooster's heart in the man, transforming him into a cocky seducer and superstud that must certainly have inspired Jerry Lewis's "Mister Love" in his "Nutty Professor".
The film is a mad hodge-podge of sentimental comedy, science fiction satire, dream-like escapades into a back-lot Venice, dancing girls, fantasy and whimsy, all neatly tied up into a traditional happy-end.
It was almost traditional for Fernandel comedies, by this time, for him to get the girl at the end, but this one goes one step further by presenting him as an irresistible Casanova, which his success had probably made him in real life, whether he liked it or not. The effect is most liberating as Fernandel's seductive powers have always been immense.
The film is not a masterpiece by a long shot, but it does not have a single tepid moment and goes merrily along its happy way in a somewhat dated but characteristic fashion. And Fernandel can always be counted on to deliver the charm, the musicianship, the humour, the wit and the laughs (with a special accolade to the mysterious Robert Rouzeaud - whom I suspect is a pseudonym for Paul Azaïs in a double role - as his Italian Mephisto).