Passionnelle

1947 [FRENCH]

Drama

Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Upright 80%
IMDb Rating 6.7/10 10 118 118

Director

Edmond T. Gréville Photo
Edmond T. Gréville

Top cast

Roger Blin Photo
Roger Blin as Julien
Lyska Wells Photo
Lyska Wells as
Edouard Hemme Photo
Edouard Hemme as (as Ed. Helle)
Alexandre Fédo Photo
Alexandre Fédo as (as A. Fédo)
720p.WEB 1080p.WEB
831.19 MB
968*720
French 2.0
NR
us  cz  dk  gr  es  fi  fr  hr  hu  it  no  nl  ro  ru  sv  
24 fps
1 hr 30 min
Seeds ...
1.51 GB
1440*1072
French 2.0
NR
us  cz  dk  gr  es  fi  fr  hr  hu  it  no  nl  ro  ru  sv  
24 fps
1 hr 30 min
Seeds 1

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by ulicknormanowen 10 / 10

Another Greville's unsung gem.

Edmond T Greville worked,now in France,now in the UK .His filmography suffered accordingly. But when he broke through, he made brilliant films."Remous" , produced in the thirties, was,for the time, absolutely scandalous and they called a spade a spade: the word 'impotence" is uttered and the wife's sexual frustration is depicted as strongly as the times (mid-thirties) allowed;"Menaces" dealt with the months before WW2 in a hotel:the fear of the impending war was everywhere.One cannot help but feel the influence of Victor Vjöström's "the wind" ,a silent movie from 1928 in "le diable souffle" the wind became a true character, Greville cut loose all the visual and sound effects at his command and let the gusts surge and flow around Louvaine ."Pour une nuit d'amour might surpass all these great unsung works ; it will certainly remind you of Autant-Lara's "douce" (1942 ) which Odette Joyeux 's presence reinforce ; it deals with the clash between the working classes and the upper ones.Mme de Versanne (the extraordinary Sylvie) wants her daughter to marry a count ;a money match, but young Thérèse is not a pure heroine; she accidentally kills her lover (a servant's son) and asks a young man,Julien ,in love with her, to help her get rid of the dead body .Julien is poor ,not good-looking at all ,and the only thing he owns is a flute he plays in the night .But he is proud and he refuses the night of love promised by the wealthy girl .Admirable sequences: -The guests ,swirling round the bright lights ,while the poor boy carries the corpse along the graveyard down to the river.-The girl , racked by remorse, admitting to the crime ,which nobody believes ,not even the sisters of the convent ; "God too does not want scandal " She bitterly says.-The wedding in the church celebrated with great pomp while the poor boy is harassed by the populace, who has found the ideal scapegoat ; Julien is so in awe of the selfish girl that he doesn't even try to vindicate himself .-The flute ,falling into the sewer ....Based on a Zola novel.
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Reviewed by jromanbaker 10 / 10

An Unexpected Masterpiece

Greville in my opinion was not a great film maker, but arguably in ' Passionnelle ' (UK title and given an X certificate in its uncut release) he made a film that I certainly would call a masterpiece, and it should be more well-known than it is. Odette Joyeux is extraordinary in it as a disturbed young woman with sadistic tendencies who murders easily and then half-heartily repents and gets a young man to dispose of the murdered man's body and offers her body as repayment. Based on a Zola short story called ' For One Night of Love ' it does the writer justice. End of spoilers. So why is it so fine a film? The almost Gothic atmosphere is well maintained and the casting of Roger Blin as Julien the 'innocent ' helper who truly loves her was a stroke of genius. His bizarrely beautiful face carries every emotion, and then some, and the use of close ups is incredible, both of Joyeux and of him. It also made me think of Astruc's ' The Crimson Curtain ' made a few years later and again another ' lost ' film. For viewers to judge for themselves if they can find both films.

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