If they made any more versions of this famous Victor Hugo tale I think I'd go mad and rush around the streets spouting French gibberish and tearing everything apart in a frantic search for cider apples or a loaf of bread. It's all reminiscent of Charles Dickens in that it's a sketch -- a long sketch -- of what can happen to you when you don't have enough money for fundamental things.
Well, briefly, Jean Valjean (Baur) is a convict released after 19 years in prison for stealing bread and trying to escape. He's a real slob. When a friendly bishop invites him to a meal and puts him up for the night, he steals off with the silverware.
But he reforms, after violating his parole. He works in a glass factory, discovers a new means of producing cheap glass, prospers, and becomes a good man who is finally elected mayor. The problem is that the local chief of police, Inspector Javert (Vanel), thinks he recognizes the new mayor and job-creator-in-chief as the escaped prisoner, Jean Valjean. The inspector used to be a corrections officer at Valjean's prison and he is, of course, right, though he can't prove it.
In the end, Valjean gives up his real identity and loses his status in order to save an innocent man who has been mistakenly identified as Valjean. After exposing himself in court, Valjean escapes with a little orphan girl he has more or less adopted and takes off for the city.
What follows is almost an entirely different story, connected to the first part by the thread of Inspector Javert's obsessive pursuit of Valjean and his little girl, Cosette. Towards the end there is a revolution and some exciting action, including a scenic tour of the city's cloaca maxima. If Vienna in 1948 had had such a filthy sewer, not even Harry Lime would have used it as an escape route. And there is a heart-tugging scene in which Valjean stands out on the street, listening to the music, as the aristos, now including his beloved daughter Cosette, dance the cachelot or the cucaracha or whatever it is.
I haven't seen all the other versions of "Les Miserables." Compared to the two I remember best -- the versions with Frederic March and Liam Neeson -- this evidently sticks closest to the original novel. The makes it quite a longie, almost four hours.
As much as I hate to use the word in any assessment of a film, especially a French film, this one is pretty "arty" for its time, 1934. The sets are very well done. The direction is as good as can be expected. The movie moves at a good pace. At dramatic moments the camera is delicately tilted from the horizontal. Baur is good as Jean Valjean. As the dying girl Fantine, Florel is almost unbearably extravagant in every move and utterance. Vanel's Javert is icier than most or, one might argue, wooden. I preferred Geoffrey Rush in the Liam Neeson version. Rush was deliciously neurotic.
You know, though, that though I've made some fun of this movie, it was light years ahead of most of the features being ground out in Hollywood.
Well, briefly, Jean Valjean (Baur) is a convict released after 19 years in prison for stealing bread and trying to escape. He's a real slob. When a friendly bishop invites him to a meal and puts him up for the night, he steals off with the silverware.
But he reforms, after violating his parole. He works in a glass factory, discovers a new means of producing cheap glass, prospers, and becomes a good man who is finally elected mayor. The problem is that the local chief of police, Inspector Javert (Vanel), thinks he recognizes the new mayor and job-creator-in-chief as the escaped prisoner, Jean Valjean. The inspector used to be a corrections officer at Valjean's prison and he is, of course, right, though he can't prove it.
In the end, Valjean gives up his real identity and loses his status in order to save an innocent man who has been mistakenly identified as Valjean. After exposing himself in court, Valjean escapes with a little orphan girl he has more or less adopted and takes off for the city.
What follows is almost an entirely different story, connected to the first part by the thread of Inspector Javert's obsessive pursuit of Valjean and his little girl, Cosette. Towards the end there is a revolution and some exciting action, including a scenic tour of the city's cloaca maxima. If Vienna in 1948 had had such a filthy sewer, not even Harry Lime would have used it as an escape route. And there is a heart-tugging scene in which Valjean stands out on the street, listening to the music, as the aristos, now including his beloved daughter Cosette, dance the cachelot or the cucaracha or whatever it is.
I haven't seen all the other versions of "Les Miserables." Compared to the two I remember best -- the versions with Frederic March and Liam Neeson -- this evidently sticks closest to the original novel. The makes it quite a longie, almost four hours.
As much as I hate to use the word in any assessment of a film, especially a French film, this one is pretty "arty" for its time, 1934. The sets are very well done. The direction is as good as can be expected. The movie moves at a good pace. At dramatic moments the camera is delicately tilted from the horizontal. Baur is good as Jean Valjean. As the dying girl Fantine, Florel is almost unbearably extravagant in every move and utterance. Vanel's Javert is icier than most or, one might argue, wooden. I preferred Geoffrey Rush in the Liam Neeson version. Rush was deliciously neurotic.
You know, though, that though I've made some fun of this movie, it was light years ahead of most of the features being ground out in Hollywood.