Louis Malle pushed against taboos in many of his films, starting with "Les Amantes" (The Lovers) with Jeanne Moreau in 1958 (the US Supreme Court eventually overturned an Ohio court's judgment that it was obscene, one step in distinguishing sexual content from being blocked as necessarily "obscene") and particularly with "Pretty Baby" and "Le souffle au coeur" (Murmurs of Heart). There is anarchic humor in many of his ostensibly dramatic movies—IMO more than in his 1960 adaptation of Raymond Queneau's comic novel "Zazie dans le Métro."

I remember enjoying the 1965 comedy he directed about an early start of the Mexican Revolution that involved a French traveling circus troupe, "Viva María". In it, both Brigitte Bardot and Jeanne Moreau (names that rhyme in French) play characters named Marie ("María" in Spanish)!.

The film opens with the literally explosive highlights of Bardot's Marie's life. Her Irish family never surrendered to British occupation of Ireland, and from an early age she was her bomb-setting (terrorist) father's assistant. They got around, and somehow, after her father was killed, she was fleeing in Mexico. The authorities thought they were chasing an Irish boy. Yes, Brigitte Bardot, passing as an Irish lad!

After Moreau's Marie's partner commits suicide after being left by a man, Bardot's Marie hides atop her horse-drawn trailer/wagon. Moreau feeds her and proposes she replace the dead woman in the singing act.

When Bardot starts to burst out of her costume on stage, Moreau displays solidarity by removing some of her own garments. Their accidental "invention" of the strip tease makes them the main draw of the show. This part of the movie is the funniest.

The real world (or a caricature of it) intrudes with George Hamilton attempting to organize a peasant revolution against the oppression of the Diaz regime (with José Ángel Espinosa as the tin-pot dictator). Hamilton speaking French as a Mexican is almost as unexpected as Bardot passing as an Irish boy! I can't really say whether he is any good. He isn't really called upon to act, but looks the martyr part, and appeals to Moreau's Marie.

She promises to carry on le huelga (the struggle) and with considerable aid of often very imaginative sorts from the rest of the circus troupe—and particularly from Bardot's expertise with guns and bombs—the last half of the movie portrays a successful mobilization in which the two Marías come to be regarded as saints (to the annoyance of the Holy Mother Church, which is intimately involved with the oppressive regime).

The middle part is only intermittently funny, but the Mexican sites and action are gorgeously photographed by Henri Decaë (who shot "400 Blows" for Truffaut, "Plein soleil" for Clément, "Le Samouraï" and most of Melville's other movies). He used the full width of the screen in often quite complicated compositions (à la Kurosawa). The wagons are shot with many scenic backgrounds, and there are train scenes (always a plus for me).

The final battle has some silly sight gags and some inspired ones.

I like "Viva María" more than Leone's "Fistful of Dynamite" (aka "Duck, Sucker"). Both are odd comedies with lots of explosions, so that it should appeal to American audiences now. Knowing what iconic figures Bardot and Moreau isn't necessary, but, I think, adds to the pleasure of watching them having a good time in roles quite different from the ones that made them icons of international cinema. (The blacker comedy of Ralph Nelson's "Wrath of God" with Robert Mitchum also appeals to me. The 1960s comedy about anarchists that is not set in Mexico, "Lady L" with Sophia Loren in the title part is a dud.)

(I don't know what it means that the only two 1960s French comedies I remember as being funny—the other is Phillipe de Broca's 1964 "That Man from Rio" with Jean-Paul Belomondo—are set in Latin America.)

The DVD has good color and sound transfer; readable, grammatical subtitles; and no extras other than a funny trailer (which reveals something that I think should come as a surprise, so that I recommend that those who have not seen the movie before not watch the trailer before watching the movie). Frustratingly (in that I wanted to see shooting locations), there are no credits.

BTW, Jean-Claude Carrière, who was credited as writing the script with Malle, wrote most of the last Luis Buñuel movies (including "Diary of a Chambermaid," which starred Moreau). "Viva María!" has some of the comedy (and, especially, the anticlericism) of Buñuel's movies in French (after Buñuel's Mexican years). Buñuel's son Juan Luis and Völker Schlöndorff were assistant directors. (Juan Luis Buñuel has also been an assistant director on "Diary of a Chambermaid.")

Postscript Bardot's Marie's father is a terrorist, either proto- or freelance-IRA. The mayhem of his bombs in the opening montage is cartoonish, which may annoy some viewers. (Actually, the violence in the revolutionary Mexico half of the movie is also cartoonish in a recognizably 1960s way—Richard Lester Beatles and musketeers movies leap to mind along with Philippe de Broca's Belomondo movies.) At the time, the French had recent experience of bomb-terrorism in the struggle over independence for Algeria.

There is no nudity (they strip only to their bloomers) or profanity or simulated sex scenes, though Bardon't Marie discovers sex (after changing from boy's clothes) and that she enjoys it. This, however, is shown when she is returned or returns to her trailer as the troupe is about to move on or is already in motion.

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This French retrouvaille is a contribution to Ifif1938's celebration/writeoff.


©2006, Stephen O. Murray


Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older