As an admirer of Louis Jouvet I have long coveted this film and now, at last, I own it thanks thanks to the boundless generosity of the Norwegian film buff who has provided so many memorable movies over the years. Jouvet was primarily a man of the theatre who condescended to appear in films to finance his theatre work, possibly inspiring Orson to do the same thing years later though in Orson's case he appeared in crap to finance art-house fodder. Jouvet played stage actors on film in such titles as La Fin du jour and Miquette et sa mere and here he plays a dramatic teacher which was again close to home as he had done this in real life as well. Henri Jeanson provided his usual pithy dialogue and there are sightings of Julien Carette and Marcel Dalio. Claude Dauphin is ostensibly the leading man but we needn't dwell on him. Marc Allegret enjoyed a fairly long if mainly undistinguished career - his Fanny, for example is arguably the weakest of the great Pagnol trilogy and a movie he made in England, Blanche Fury, didn't exactly set the screen ablaze - but this is definitely one of if not the highlight.
Review of The Curtain Rises
