Day 39/41 The Last Metro (1980)

François Truffaut's The Last Metro is a lush romance built around the story of a theatre owner who must hide her Jewish husband in occupied Paris. Catherine Deneuve (as a famous actress/manager) is at her most radiant beauty, paired with passionate Gérard Depardieu (as her lover) and cerebral Heinz Bennent (as her husband). Will Deneuve and Depardieu fall in love? That question becomes one of the viewers questions. If the film plays a little too close to the feel of Casablanca, so what?

Truffaut films his movie on obvious sound stages where the look reminds me of the early Technicolor of the MGM films. For a film about theatre, the style seems appropriate. 

About half-way through, as the passion between Deneuve and Depardieu heats up, I became aware that every frame used a bright vermilion for accent or was bathed in monochromatic schemes of the same. The seats and walls of the theatre are vermilion. Deneuve in the play-within-a-film wears a Victorian red dress against an unadorned set of pastel variations of the same color. The color stunningly off-sets Deneuve's blonde hair and luminous skin tone. Often the vermillion was paired with a rich earth/chocolate color. Strikingly, when Deneuve must venture into the Gestapo's headquarters a large Nazi flag with red background is featured prominently. Later in the film, Deneuve's costume colors move to a dark red, and later, black and beige. 

The film becomes much more newsreelish near the end, with narrator resolving the action. A particularly nice touch at the end which blends reality with theatricality, reminding us that all we have seen is just a theatrical presentation of real life.

I have always found Deneuve a fascinating actress to watch and she works well with Depardieu. The film is an enjoyable look at a very serious side of French life during World War II.

The Last Metro (1980) ****