Life itself is a carousel. Too often, the most likely causes
and effects feed into each other in the most circumstantial manners. One nail
tickles off, the whole set of wheels fall apart. This succinctly states the
style in the films of Max Ophüls, who becomes legendary for his fluid camera
movement and also his women films. He has significant influences on directors
like Kubrick, Scorsese and Anderson. Indeed, one may compare Ophüls to Kenji
Mizoguchi from the East, who unflinchingly portrayed the plight of Japanese
women and also renowned for his tracking camera style and long takes. Both
masters were on a roll in the 1950s, but quite unfortunately, both passed away
by the end of the 1950s. The film I would like to share with you today is
Ophüls’ masterpiece in 1953 – ‘The Earrings of Madame De’.
If your other half often lands you into financial troubles,
then ‘Madame De’ should serve as a verdict for this. The female protagonist,
Louise (her surname was never mentioned, hence ‘Madame De’), had a husband
called Andre, who was a general. She didn’t really love him, they slept in
separate rooms, and she was sort of a queen of gambling. Of course, bouts of
blackjacks led Louise into a severe debt problem. So the solution? Sell off a pair of earrings given to her by
Andre. She lied and orchestrated a saga of her ‘stolen earrings’, and when the
situation went public, the jewel trader who possessed the pair of earrings
decided to turn himself in to Andre. Although dismayed by this, Andre brought
back the earrings and secretly offered them to his mistress, who also entered
the debt horizon by gambling too much. She
pawned the pair of earrings in order to overcome her debt burden. The earrings
were now bought by Donati, an Italian baron. Later Louise met him and they found passion
towards each other. They danced and
danced and danced (no exaggeration here - this was the most iconic scenes in
Ophüls’ films) to a secret romance. Not realizing all the fabrications, Donati
decided to impress her by offering her a gift – the same pairs of earrings which
originated from Louise! Already suspecting
adulterous affairs between Louise and Donati, Andre cornered Donati, gave him
the earrings and urged him to sell it back to the trader, so that Andre could
buy it again and gave it to Louise as a sign of love. The disappointed Donati
said farewell to Louise and this immensely depressed her. Instead, Andre asked Louise to give the
earrings to her niece as a gift for her new birth. And ironically, the niece
also had a husband plus gambling trouble, and so she sold the earrings once
more to the trader. Answering to her own feelings, Louise desperately pawned a
substantial quantity of her belongings just to get back the pair of earrings.
This offended Andre and hence he challenged Donati to a duel. This distressed
Louise because Andre had great marksmanship and Donati’s chance was slim. She
asked Donati not to go but he insisted he would. Andre had the first shot, and
Donati stood still to take it. A gunshot was heard by Louise and she fell to
her oblivion. Finally, the pair of earrings found their haven amidst a corrupt
world - the church.
Fluid camera movement was Ophüls’ signature style. To me, not only it achieved a stylistic effect,
the unique style also reflected the structure and theme of the story. The pair
of earrings acted as a central axis for the whole plot and the placements of
the earrings served as the motivation and pushed forward the narrative of the
film. The pair of earrings was passed onto different hands, and in a sense the
possessions represented a continuous, cyclical whole. The scene before the
climax saw the earrings being returned to Louise, as if a circle has been
completed. When Louise danced intimately with Donati, this was the only time
she was willing to commit to a true feeling for affection. Besides that, she
led a senseless life which seemed only to be consumed by material wealth and
deceptions. The tragic dimension of the story stemmed from the duos’ ‘Rondo’: they danced around in a fluid, smooth movement,
their bodies drifted to different possible spaces, but their relationships were
literally going to nowhere. This amor fou very much resonated with the forever
drifting pairs of earrings - the only final stable point could lead to a
spiritual transcendence, which could not be found in this world.
A contentious issue concerned Ophüls’ original vision for ‘Madame
de’ - that he intended to shoot the whole film through mirrors. This
unfortunately could not be materialized due to pressure from the producers.
Nevertheless, scenes involving mirrors were still present throughout the film.
Mirrors encompassed the double, and Max Ophüls’ mirrors served as a window to
the past, to the inaccessible. In the film, almost everyone was double-faced,
almost everyone was behind a mask. Fabrications and deceptions were constructed
to cover up one's negative sides. Louise lied for a number of times to save
herself from embarrassment, including an epic theatrical performance of finding
her own earrings in front of her husband, yet she was not willing to come to
terms with herself honestly. Regarding the romance between Louise and Donati,
the pair seemed inaccessible towards each other. Louise was veiled behind a façade,
and Donati regretfully was left in the dark about the intrinsic web of
relationships that bound all the other characters together. Their associations
were a faulty move - a relationship that would not be authentic and would
ultimately lead to Donati’s demise.
To get the earrings back, what are you willing to lose?
by Ed Law
19/4/2015
Film Analysis - 40
