Jean Vigo is an unaccountably obscure master. His L'Atalante, a full length feature film is astoundingly good, although I found the use of bohemian theater props and the medieval Jean-Phlippe less original than Vigo's other work. The film Taris is a remarkable tribute to water on film. Water itself is represented in a way that transcends time, like Sargeant or Hokusai. The water of 1930 lives on film.
But as to Vigo's greatest film, I say it was his first, A propos de Nice. This is a travel-documentary but it is also living history. The nearest comparison would be Mr. Hulot's Holiday. Much has been made about Vigo's division of the film into the rich and the poor, but really it is no more than a flourish. What is overwhelming is Vigo's eye itself. Nothing seems staged. It is life in the raw.
One outstanding part of the film deals with can-can. Here we see what the can-can really is. Not the formalized line dancing of Pig Allee, but simply the gyrations of little girls still gyrating.
None of us will ever be able to visit Nice in 1930, but A propos de Nice gives us a window. The excitement of life is there for us.
But as to Vigo's greatest film, I say it was his first, A propos de Nice. This is a travel-documentary but it is also living history. The nearest comparison would be Mr. Hulot's Holiday. Much has been made about Vigo's division of the film into the rich and the poor, but really it is no more than a flourish. What is overwhelming is Vigo's eye itself. Nothing seems staged. It is life in the raw.
One outstanding part of the film deals with can-can. Here we see what the can-can really is. Not the formalized line dancing of Pig Allee, but simply the gyrations of little girls still gyrating.
None of us will ever be able to visit Nice in 1930, but A propos de Nice gives us a window. The excitement of life is there for us.