Manon

After the Liberation, a former Resistance fighter rescues manon, a collaborator, from the avenging villagers. They flee to Paris where drives her lover to jealous rage by her involvement with profiteering and prostitution but, when he commits murder, she leaves France with him. Like Sacha Guitry, Clouzot was embittered by his treatment at the hands of the nation’s liberators, and like Guitry he gave his own, oblique response to them in a film. In ‘Manon’ he transformed the Abbe Prevost’s celebrated eighteenth century young lovers into lumpen refugees from a chaotic France in the midst of lawless ‘liberation’. ‘Manon’ is arguably one of Clouzot’s least convincing and well-formed films, but it is also one of his most personal, deeply felt works, dripping with contempt for what the director saw as his critics’ hypocritical refusal to admit the evils of the ocupation years had not ceased when France was ‘free’, because corruption has its roots in human nature itself and not in the actions of particular individuals.” Reference: Alan Williams. Republic of images: a history of French filmmaking. Harvard University Press, 1992. Awards: Golden Lion Venice Film Festival (Mostra) 1949.

Credits: Producer, P. E. Decharme ; director, Henri-Georges Clouzot ; writers, Henri-Georges Clouzot, Jean Ferry ; photography, Armand Thirard ; music, Paul Misraki ; art direction, Max Douy.
Cast: Cecile Aubry, Michel Auclair, Serge Reggiani, Gabrielle Dorziat, Raymond Souplex, Simone Valere, Dora Doll, Rosy Varte, Michel Bouquet, Robert Dalban, actors from the Lancey Yiddish Theatre.