Director: René Clair
The best-selling novel by the best-selling novelist has been adapted and reimagined countless times since its publication in 1939, but perhaps no version is better loved than René Clair’s 1945 original. For good reason–like the other great films that the French master made in Hollywood (including I Married a Witch and It Happened Tomorrow), And Then There Were None is a well-paced genre picture that is elevated by an extraordinary cast and consistently inventive, dynamic visuals. Take the outdoor scenes, for instance, in which the strangers survey the island in search of the absent Mr. Owen. Clair often shoots the cast from a low angle and has them occupy only the bottom half of the frame–although the angle might suggest their power in conventional film language terms, the vast sky is actually the oppressive force, suggesting their powerlessness. That this is a film very much about voyeurism and paranoia also gives Clair a number of opportunities to play with the idea of spectatorship. Most memorably, he films one character looking through a keyhole, only to pull the camera back and reveal that another character is looking at the first character through a different keyhole, and so on. The cast is stacked with great supporting players, but perhaps the most memorable performance is Richard Haydn as the bumbling butler who takes great offense to being considered a prime suspect early in the investigation.
Director: René Clair
Largely neglected today in favor of director René Clair’s later fantastical romantic comedy I Married a Witch, The Ghost Goes West is a hugely successful aesthetic achievement with charm to spare due to its gentle, even-handed satire and likable stars. Robert Donat plays a dual role as both a disgraced Scottsman who is doomed to haunt a castle until he brings pride back to his family name and as his descendent. The father (Eugene Pallette) of the woman (Jean Parker) that the living Donat has fallen in love with purchases the castle and plans to move it to Florida with a publicity scheme on his mind. It is the early sequences in the Scottish castle that are the most memorable. Clair details the estate beautifully with rolling fogs at nights and an abundance of farm animals roaming the grounds in the afternoon, and in building the anticipation for the first haunting he successfully gives the castle character–shots linger on objects such as the mechanical movement of a clock as if to suggest the livingness of the building itself. The early ribbing at Scottish pride is matched equally by the boisterous, money-grubbing American businessman in the end, and even if the comedy isn’t as sharp-tongued as it could have been it is smart and amiably written throughout. Jean Parker (a dead ringer both visually and in her comedic timing for Jean Arthur) is particularly good as the curious love interest.
Director: René Clair
Like René Clair’s other fantasy film made during his wartime exile (I Married a Witch), It Happened Tomorrow is an intensely atmospheric, quick-paced comedy that is darkened by a magical brand of fatalism that threatens the likable hero. In this case, Dick Powell plays a reporter during the gay nineties who has been receiving tomorrow’s newspapers. He responds to the discovery with glee and soars to new professional and financial heights… that is, until one of the papers he receives informs him that he will be murdered the next day. What transpires is an equally comic and suspenseful chase towards his seemingly unavoidable demise, with the climax occurring in a nicely accomplished manic setpiece that scholars have linked to the energetic farces that Clair made in his home country. The cinematography credited to the prolific Eugen Schüfftan and Archie Stout is the real highlight–the appearances of the ghostly figure that gives Powell the newspapers are rendered memorably eery by shadows, fog, and claustrophobic framings. As a piece of moralism the picture flounders the opportunity for philosophical resonance (surely there are reasons to live in the moment other than getting into trouble with the law), but as a fantastical piece of Hollywood froth it’s kind of irresistible.
Director: René Clair
Present day, 1942. A bolt of lightning collides with an old oak tree, whose roots constrict the long-dead souls of a witch and her father burned at the stake three hundred years prior. Two clouds of smoke appear and begin talking to each other. “Twill be sweet to plague the human race again!”, says the daughter, to which the father responds, “First we will visit the corn field and ruin the crop. ‘Tis always a good way to limber up!” This largely undiscovered gem from René Clair is a masterpiece of oddball, fantastical comedy that one might speculate was a partial inspiration for Bewitched. Veronica Lake plays a witch who returns to carry out a curse on the ancestor of the man who had burned her at the stake. Naturally, she falls in love with him. A more charming picture you’re unlikely to find, and in it’s best moments the effort recalls the work of Preston Sturges through it’s quick succession of punch lines and the Code-evading sexual humor. Fredric March may be miscast, though his shortcomings are redeemed by the hilarious performances from Veronica Lake as the conniving witch and Cecil Kellaway as her drunkard father.
For Reel 