After watching the superb 1941 film Who Killed Santa Claus?,I decided to take a look at a DVD sellers page for other titles by co- director Christian-Jaque.Getting near the end of the first page,I spotted a film which sounded like a companion piece to Who Killed,that led to me getting ready to meet the Bellmen.

The plot:

Called "Bellmen" by everyone in reference to his job, Jean-Baptiste tries to pass the time by talking to fellow bellmen Fabret.As Fabret talks about his daughter Catherine,Jean-Baptiste spots a man riding by. Sneaking out,Jean-Baptiste grabs a stone and kills the man.Running out, Fabret discovers the dead body,and Jean-Baptiste pulling a bag of cash from the dead man's clothes.As the dead man's blacks horse disappears into the horizon, Jean-Baptiste and Fabret cut a deal.Returning to town for the first time in three days in order to care for his Catherine,Fabret finds himself unable to escape the black horse of death.

View on the film:

Returning to the small town setting just a year after France was liberated from Nazi rule,co-writer/(along with Jacques Prévert) director Christian-Jaque & cinematographer Louis Page bask the title in a chilling Gothic Film Noir atmosphere,where the horse of the apocalypse rides into town with death. Circling the village with snow covered stones and graceful tracking shots breathing in the rustic Horror Noir mood,Jaque and Page ring the bells with the Bellmen in gliding stylised shots,as razor sharp overlapping shots sink Jean-Baptiste and Pierre into a fiery pit of Film Noir hell.

Bringing their adaptation of Claude Boncompain's novel out of the clouds,the screenplay by Jaque & Prévert blends rich Gothic Melodrama with horrific Film Noir doom.Injecting the superb dialogue with a sharp playfulness,the writers gradually entangle Catherine's romantic troubles with her dads fears of Baptiste's killing being dug out of the snow.Keeping Baptiste round the bell tower,the writers open up the in-fighting of the townspeople,whilst slowly spilling the dread from Baptiste and the horse of death over the village.

Caked in a thick black beard, Fernand Ledoux gives a fantastic performance as Fabret,with Ledoux bringing a method to Fabret's madness,as the loss of his wife and illness of Catherine weigh down on his shoulders,as the snow covers Fabret's hands with dirty money.Casting a long shadow over the town, Lucien Coëdel gives a brittle performance as Baptiste,whose rugged shell Coëdel cracks to unveil a ruthlessly mischievous Film Noir loner,who along with tightly keeping Fabret on track,also has his eyes secretly set on Catherine.Running against the hard gazes of Baptiste and Fabret,the stunning Renée Faure (who made her debut as another Catherine in Who Killed Santa) gives an excellent performance as Catherine,thanks to Faure sparkling in her criss-cross romantic exchanges with cad Pierre (a great Roger Pigaut) and also displaying a real bite in Catherine's fight against rival lover Marthe, (a splendidly stern Madeleine Robinson)as the Bellmen bell tolls.

Spellbinding,fascinating film,in a wintry snowy atmosphere which Christian-Jaque's camera perfectly captures.Wonderful pictures:the dead body in the snow raising a hand;the dark horse,galloping in the mountains,as if this animal were demanding justice for his murdered master;the fete ,with the dance complete with quaint instruments ... The whole movie is a feast for the eye .The soundtrack essentially consists of the old French folk song "Aux Marches du Palais " (which Serge Bourguignon would use again in "Cybèle Et Les Dimanches de Ville D'Avray" aka "Sundays and Cybèle" ) which is played again and again,and even sung in full by Renée Faure.

If the film is visually a splendor,I do not think that Prévert's screenplay is perfect .It sometimes drags on and the first dialog between Ledoux and Coedel is rather talky;so is Pigaut's and Faure's interminable love scene.Renée Faure is not attractive enough to portray a romantic peasant girl successfully.She is overshadowed,every step of the way ,by sensational Madeleine Robinson ,one of the greatest actresses France has ever had.Robinson and Pigaut had already teamed up in Claude Autant-Lara's classic "Douce" (1942) and the scenes where they are together (particularly the ball)takes the film out on a level of stratospheric intensity that simply rises above the rest and makes the

Faure/Pigaut scenes bland by comparison.

Like this?Try these:

"Goupi Mains Rouges" Jacques Becker 1943

"L'Assassinat du Père Noel" Christian -Jaque 1941

"Barry" Richard Pottier 1949

At first glance you could be forgiven for assuming that Christian Jacque was revisiting L'Assassinat de Pere Noel which he made for Continental three years earlier; remote setting, wintry landscapes, etc but actally there is much more on offer, not least Madeleine Robinsion who, as a previous poster has rightly said, was one of the finest French actresses of her generation; it was her misfortune to appear in films that were aimed at domestic rather than international markets so that unlike Danielle Darrieux, Edwige Feuilliere, Micheline Presle, Arletty, etc, all of whom were, of course, equally gifted but contrived to be seen and/or work outside France, Robinson remains one of the best-kept secrets in French cinema. A script by Jacques Prevert doesn't exactly impair a film either if anybody asks you and here he is right on top of his game; add some stunning images, a horse against the snow, etc, and we're talking another winner.