The Earrings of Madame de... (1954)

As a cinema lover, I've always admired Max Ophüls with his romantic movies and his fantastic and vertiginous camera movements. And his very very best is of course "Madame de ..." which can also be considered as one of the best movie of Danièle Darrieux in her high society woman character. Two legends working together.And very sadly, I learned today that DD passed away, just a few days after Jean Rochefort (they played together in "Du Grabuge Chez Les Veuves" and "Le Dimanche de la Vie" which I recommend, DD is very caustic in this one). She played in so many great movies since 1931, what a voice, what a silhouette, what a face. So long DD.

The two top gallant gentlemen of the cinema as rivals of its most beautiful woman, both loving her beyond expression in the subtlest possible intrigue of fate as unpredictable as an improvised thriller in which the writer himself has no idea of where the mechanics of destiny will lead him or the puppets of his tale, a labyrinth of love leading everywhere but out of it, filmed with all the refined expertise of perhaps the greatest film director of all, using his constantly moving camera for an overwhelming constant flood of beauty and poetry. This is simply incredible. You can see every film of his again and again forever, since their richness of details and amounting complications of human feelings always expressed by hints and understatements are unfathomably without end. Danielle Darrieux. great already in the 30s and chosen by most cinema lovers as the one outstanding film queen of beauty, is 99 today (1st of May 2016), while her warm beauty dominates her every film forever. Charles Boyer is always reliably excellent and here nobler than ever as the husband, while Vittorio de Sica perhaps makes his most sincere performance as the passionate lover, just as honestly romantic as Charles Boyer's absolute nobility couldn't be more convincing. What about the story, then, actually seemingly superficially a trifle of unavoidable complications resulting from white lies, but the miracle is how this mere miniature of an episodic detail is aggrandized into a love drama of more than epic proportions involving all kinds of storms of a thrilling melodrama. Comedy or tragedy? No, just a human documentary charting an ocean of the complications of being just human. To this comes Oscar Straus' delightful music adorning the masterpiece with a golden frame of tenderness, as if the composer adored the poor victims of this train of complications resulting from the mere trifle of a white lie. Is anyone committing any mistake at all to deserve all this agony of unnecessary self-torture resulting from mere complexes of feelings? No, in all this towering guilt no one is to blame for anything. They are all as innocent as children getting mixed up in a game that goes beyond them. Maybe the tragedy could have been avoided, but then the French are as they are with a penchant for an irrevocably undeniable mentality of Crime Passionnel. There Max Ophuls finds a dead end of his story and film, which perhaps was necessary, or else a story like this could never have ended. In fact, there was a continuation, but Ophuls cut it out, forcing himself to avoid overdoing it. The masterpiece just couldn't be driven further.Still, it's not his best film. But it's a perfect example of the virtuosity of his art.

In the end of the Nineteenth Century, in Paris, the futile Countess Louise (Danielle Darrieux) is spending too much money and decides to sell the valuable earrings her wealthy husband, General André (Charles Boyer), gave to her in their wedding to the jeweler Mr. Rémy (Jean Debucourt) to pay her debts. Then she lies to her husband telling that she has lost them in the theater. When the general resolves to call the police, Mr. Rémy visits his client and discloses the truth about the earrings. General André secretly buys the earrings again and gives to his mistress Lola (Lia Di Leo) that is moving to Constantinople. Lola gambles and loses, and needs to sell the earrings. The Italian diplomat Baron Fabrizio Donati (Vittorio De Sica) sees the earrings in a window of a pawn shop, he buys them. Donati travels to Paris and meets Louise, and they become lovers. He gives the earrings to Louise and she tells another lie to her husband, telling that she found them in her drawer. Her little lies lead the lovers to a tragedy. "The Earrings of Madame de..." is a beautiful and stylish romance directed by Max Ophüls where a pair of earrings is the pivot for romantic but also tragic situations. The production is impressive, with wonderful locations and set decoration, elegant costumes and magnificent black and white cinematography. The story of a passionate woman that uses to lie and finds her true love is tense, with great performances. I saw this movie for the first time on 24 June 2001 and I have just seen it again. My vote is eight.Title (Brazil): "Desejos Proibidos" ("Forbidden Desires")

Okay. Time for me to make a bit of a speech. I love French films and have noticed something about Max Ophüls' films (yes, I know he was German but made films in France). Practically all of his famous films have to do with adultery or prostitution. Now I guess I am a pretty old fashioned guy, but I don't enjoy scripts about these topics. So, although I'll admit he was a master storyteller, I just had a hard time getting into the stories or caring about the characters. Who cares about the husband or wife in this film? They both were pretty despicable rich folks who seemed to have nothing to do with their time but gamble, shoot people and flirt with people other than their spouses. What idiots.The film is about a General and his wife the Comptese. They both have every reason to be happy and you think through the first part of the film that they are. But, you do know that the Comptese is unwise--she's run up gambling debts and cannot pay for them without telling her husband. They CAN afford to pay but she doesn't want him to know, so she sells her prize diamond earrings. Then, she claims they were lost. Later, the husband learns that she sold them and buys them back from the man who bought them. Then, he gives them to his mistress. In the meantime, she begins an affair with another man and he is able to buy the earrings and give them to her! There's a bit more to this and there is a sad ending, but I'll let you see this for yourself.I can't fault the film's acting. It stars Danielle Darrieux, Charles Boyer and Vittorio De Sica--all very fine actors. And, as I said above, the film looked lovely--really, really nice. I just didn't care about the characters and so I have a hard time really endorsing the film wholeheartedly. Worth seeing, but not a must-see.