a knight in shining amour
by Douglas Messerli
Jacques Sigurd (screenplay, based on an idea
by Charles Spaak and Marcel Carné), Marcel Carné
(director, assisted by Serge Friedman and Paul Seban) Les Tricheurs (The
Cheaters) aka Youthful Sinners / 1958
These 20-some year-olds, some of them members
of gangs, descend upon the mansion en masse—a few without even an
invitation—to drink, smoke, and dance with the music turned up as loud as it
can get. Their goal is to get stoned, and they mix whatever bottles of liquor
they find together in a huge bowl. In a corner some play out a version of “Truth
or Dare,” while in other corners a few bemoan the meaningless of their parents’
generation, indeed the absurdity of all bourgeois values. In some of the
bedrooms couples who can’t wait or have no other place to go are already busy
fucking. Some are so drunk already that they’ve begun picking fights. Couples
who arrived together have begun to switch companions. They dance late into the
morning, trashing the place before they drive off.
If
this sounds like a Los Angeles canyon party-house rave, an end-of-the-year frat
bust, or a New York penthouse wilding, think again. Indeed, perhaps you might
need to rethink cinema history since the scene I described above occurs twice
in a film by the great French film director of the classic of poetic realism Children
of Paradise (1945)—a film which appears on nearly all the lists of the
greatest movies—Marcel Carné, working with cinematographer Claude Renoir, the
nephew of director Jean Renoir, and the grandson of painter Pierre-Auguste
Renoir.
Yet
this film, like the New Wave works that followed, attracted a huge audience,
winning that year’s Grand Prize for French Cinema. The old master was 52 at the
time while Truffaut and Godard were 26 and 28, just a little older than the
characters he portrayed in Les
Tricheurs (known in English as The Cheaters and Youthful Sinners)
performed by actors such Jacques Charrier (who quickly became a big movie
sensation in France and a year later
married Brigette Bardot), Laurent Terzieff (who the very next year acted in
Mauro Bolognini’s La Notte brava, which I review in these pages,
performed extensively on stage, and later appeared in Luis Bunuel’s The
Milky Way) and a third “newcomer” by the name of Jean-Paul Belmondo (who,
of course, starred in Breathless and numerous other works by Godard,
Chabrol, Truffaut, Resnais, and almost all the other major directors of
European cinema). It is clear that Carné had an eye for youthful male beauty in
this trio and in the character of the lead figure Bob’s (Charrier) best friend,
Bernard (Pierre Brice), although Pascale Petit as Mic (Michèle), with whom Bob
falls in love, does not make a bad stand-in for Jean Seberg in Breathless.
In
fact, you might say that Carné, as a gay man, features his male figures in this
work in a manner that in this work’s earliest scenes almost seems to skew his
narrative in a direction that might take us down the wrong track of what, at
heart, is a normative heterosexual tale.
The handsome Bob, it is made clear from the very beginning of this
story, is an outsider to the wild youth set to whom he is introduced and with
whom he becomes thoroughly involved. He is from what they describe as “the
suburbs,” meaning anything outside the “French Quarter,” and his family is most
clearly from the well-do environs of the right back and Champs Elysée. Whenever
he even pauses to consider whether he might join in the “gang’s” (more of a
band of friends rather than what we might describe as a gang) actions,
determined mostly by the group’s leader Alain (Terzieff), he is accused of
backsliding and of being, like all parents and people who embrace the societal
order, “bourgeois.” And the film begins evidently after his involvement
with the group at the center of the rest of the story, after he has
finally graduated with his B.A. and is on the phone assuring his father that he
has clearly determined what he further actions will be after the series
of the events we about to witness.
In
essence, accordingly, we cannot truly yet evaluate his relationship with the
obviously heterosexual gang, made up of Alain, Mic, Clo, Lou (Belmondo), Nicole
(Dany Saval), Gérard, and the numerous others. Bernard, with whom he begins the
story, is clearly from his Right Bank friends, not a member of the “idle” gang
with whom Bob spends most of his time on film.
So
when Bob, in a voice over, begins his tale by observing two young boys hovering
over the juke box to play jazz, as he calls up an earlier, more innocent time
when he first met Adrian in a record shop, we can only wonder whether the blue
funk he is clearly now suffering has to do with a love for Adrian—whom a bit
like a puppy-dog he watches stealing a record in the shop, soon after paying
for Adrian’s listening-booth time, and taking him for a drink. At the first of
the two parties to which Adrian takes him, the two sit on a couch together
observing the dancing crowd, Adrian asking “So where am I going to sleep
tonight.” But then, we quickly discover, Adrian must find a bed or couch in
someone’s house every night since he has no apartment nor any money to rent
one. He relies solely on “the kindness of strangers,” so to speak, having
already been given a substantial amount of money by his newfound friend.
Upon observing an American boy (Alan Scott) being approached by a boy
named Danny, who has obviously been to bed with him
This is a minor incident of seemingly no importance to the rest of the
story, but Carné has introduced it, rather inexplicably, and cannot quite let
it go. Adrian asks Bob with whom he has overheard the entire conversation, “Are
you bothered?” Bob answers, almost predictably, “No, but I prefer girls.” But
Adrian’s answer is a bit odder, “Me too. But I don’t have
One can suppose that a complete cynic such as Adrian, whose God, as he
explains, “used to be dead, but is now indifferent,” could have no
prejudices, particularly since he can’t be choosy in finding a bed for each
night. But we still wonder why this scene is even in the movie. Surely you’d
never find such an incident in a work by Godard or Truffaut. In Godard, gay
boys in a bathroom are something to mock, but little else. And in Truffaut’s world,
other than the occasional ménage-à trois, his pictures seem
basically to be free of all things relating to sexually queer behavior.
In
The Cheaters Bob is quickly hurried away to Clo’s parent’s bedroom where
apparently to two have sex and a conversation in which you better get to know
Clo, while Bob remains a kind of pleasant smiling and cute cipher.
Yet
by the time they rejoin the party, Adrian literally has gone out of a limb, in
fact a high window ledge and crossbar, to save the cook’s cat, and is almost
sure of falling until Bob, stripping off his coat, leaps to a nearby windowsill
to help bring his friend in safe. If Adrian has described Clo as being from the
Crusades, it is as if Bob where a knight in armor determined to save his friend
or lover. Indeed, that becomes a clue
for how to comprehend his misadventures throughout the rest of the movie.
But it is useful to recall that his first such manifestation of his
romantic tendencies is performed for a male friend, not for the woman with whom
he soon falls in love, Mic, Clo’s best friend.
Mic (Petit) is perhaps the most fascinating figure in Carné’s work. From
a poor working family, she has evidently dropped out of college under the
influence of Adrian and the others, determined to be even more cynical and
nonchalant about societal values than anyone else. Having no money with which
to pay her rent, she visits her mother, who simply doesn’t have enough to loan
her; yet each time Mic visits her mother notices cash missing from her shop
register. Mic’s brother Roger (Roland Lesaffre) who works as a car mechanic is
more generous, at least willing to give her enough for food; but he also cannot
pay for her rent. While in his garage she notices a new sports car for sale for
600,000 francs, and becomes determined that she will one day own the car, even
though she is allergic, like all of the others of her friends, to any concept
of a job.
From the meeting at the party, Bob and Mic fall in love, she inviting
him to visit her, and soon after the two going to bed. The central focus of the
film is their sudden and deep passion for one another, which, given the
restrictions of their group dismissal of sentiment and bourgeoise emotion, they
intentionally refuse to express. And so what might have been a traditional love
story for Carné in the 1940s and 1950s
becomes a kind of tragedy of silence in this film, as they quickly get involved
in a societal situation which demands moral attention, another human expression
disallowed in their post-World War II hothouse bohemian philosophy. For them,
all moral values are simply corrupt.
One morning, while sleeping on another friend’s bed, Adrian is visited
by a stranger who slips a substantial amount of money under the door,
suggesting they meet that evening at a bar to settle up the rest of the matter.
We soon glean that the other boy, who has had an affair with an older woman, is
involved in a blackmail scheme, which the wealthy woman and her husband are
willing to pay if he returns her love letters. The boy himself has clearly
gotten cold feet and left town, telling Adrian to burn the letters.
But now announcing the news to his friends Bob and Mic, Adrian suggests
they meet with the mysterious man named in the note, Hippolyte Félix (Jacques Marin) to negotiate the amount. In fact
Adrian is simply happy with the down-payment, allowing him to eat and drink for
a few weeks. We perceive throughout that despite his power over the group, he
is no schemer. The record he stole in the early scene of the film was for a
friend. He relies, as I have said, on others for his survival, and seems
disinterested in manipulating anyone or demanding anything from his friends.
Mic is a different creature, and Bob, influenced it appears by the most
recent person with whom he has taken up, is willing to join her in meeting up
with Mr. Félix. They do so, she negotiating enough money for the car, another
bill, and a few weeks of lunch money.
But at the last moment, when they are to meet for the payment, Bob
appears to regain his moral compunctions, telling her that he has burnt the
letters because of the sordidness of the whole thing. Mic, we suddenly realize,
is immature and greedy, furious for his inability to carry what she considers
an easy payment for the wealthy “cheater,” possibly allowing her the
possibility to fulfill her dreams.
Bob disappears, and out of anger, Mic takes Adrian home to her apartment
for sex.
In the meantime, we discover Bob has not really burnt the letters and
has gone through with the shady business, acquiring the money, his second try
at rescuing a friend in distress. When he discovers Mic is no longer in the
bar, he runs to her room to discover her in bed with his Adrian, whom he has
realized has also loved Mic but refused to interfere with his own affair. He
simply tells Mic that it has been a joke, yet Adrian and Bob both seem more
disturbed by the end of their own close friendship than any embarrassment for
the sexual events concerning the woman they both “love.”
He cannot bring himself to show his disappointment about her behavior,
but simply throws the money at her and leaves. Mic, realizing her errors,
nonetheless buys the car and proceeds to pretend that it is just as well that
their relationship is over.
The “cheaters” of this work’s English title do not truly care deeply, I
would argue, about what Americans might imagine: people cheating on one another
sexually. Bob is not so disturbed by her having slept with Adrian as he is by
her inability to express her love for him. She is cheating herself out of her
own life by refusing to admit to the everyday sentiments—love, caring, and
responsibility—out of her silly commitment to her “gang” code of behavior.
Yet Bob also has mindlessly joined up with the gang, and is just as
unable to admit his own feelings, both for Mic and, I would argue, for Adrian.
As the pretend cynic of all time Adrian would never be able to express
his admiration for and love of Bob, and instead taunts and teases both Bob and
Mic for their secret longings. At Clo’s final bash, he puts himself, Mic, and
Bob through a “truth and dare” game to which, simply to save face in front of their friends, they all lie,
exposing themselves as horrible human beings, when in reality they are
basically loving and caring kids who simply feel they can no longer trust the
human values which destroyed their parent’s lives.
Clo has called her friends together for her last bash because, as I
mention earlier, she has discovered that she is pregnant, and has no knowledge
of who the father might have been. Presumably it could be Bob, but she asks him
if he might marry him not for that reason but because she realizes that of all
her acquaintances he is the only one in her financial “caste.” The marriage she
offers him, in which she would never intrude upon his life, is precisely what
this entire generation of young men and women, and particularly those of the
Right Bank, most detest.
Predictably, Bob says no, she perfectly understanding his decision but obviously now desperate nonetheless.
After Bob and Mic go through their play-acting lies of the game of
“Truth” in which they both reiterate that they have utterly no feelings for one
another, Bob returns to the main room where the now utterly drunk Clo has just
shouted out that she is going to get married. The crowd, gathering around,
demands to know who. And suddenly Bob, in his third attempt in this film to
save a life, has finally become a confused knight in shining amour, rising in
the midst of the chaotic celebrating to shout out “Moi.” But his
continuation of his rash announcement, “Since all women are the same, whores
and bitches at least with Clo there won’t be any surprises,” reveals he perhaps
does not like girls as much as he thought he did.
Mic immediately bolts, a Cinderella who has not just lost her shoe but
her prince. She speeds away in her Jaguar, with Bob soon in chase, his final
and most fatal rescue attempt.
Since we know immediately the result of this countryside race, surely
Bob must also know what he is doing, that the closer he gets to her the more
she will speed up until something is put in the way to bring her to a stop—in
this case a truck slowly driving the rural lane into which she seemingly
purposely crashes.
Carné ridiculously postpones the inevitable in order to have Bob and
Roger meet up in the hospital so that the latter can express the director’s own
moral sympathies for a new lost generation who must face a “treacherous world”
alone. Mic dies, Bob becomes brave, and an even younger generation of boys and
girls make plans for a wild party that night. So, sentimentalizes Carné, who
previously worked so very hard to resist his moral homilies: youth will always seem
wild and out of control to the generation before it as the new gradually are
forced to come to terms with their lives.
Bob isn’t gay perhaps, but he’s surely confused about his sexual life.
At least he now may have learned that before he attempts to come to the rescue
of anyone else he might first try to save himself.
Los Angeles, September 11, 2021
Reprinted from World Cinema Review (September
2021).
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