Au bonheur des dames (1943)
Directed by André Cayatte

Film Review

Au Bonheur des dames was one of the most lavish productions made by the German-run company Continental Films at the time of the Nazi Occupation of France. Based on the eleventh novel in Émile Zola's Rougon-Macquart saga, the film almost totally subverts Zola's original intention and offers a shameless endorsement of Pétainism at its most basic.  Despite its obvious political subtext (which earned it some unfavourable criticism during and after the Occupation), the film is technically flawless and arguably the most visually impressive film made by Continental.  The scale of the sets and attention to detail are remarkable for a film of this era, providing the grandest and most authentic portrait of Second Empire France.  Whilst the film is generally less well-regarded than an earlier silent adaptation directed by Julien Duvivier in 1930, it deserves to be considered one of the great classics of 1940s French cinema.

The film was directed by former lawyer André Cayatte, the second of three films he made for Continental, the others being the comedy La Fausse maîtresse (1942) and Pierre et Jean (1943), based on a Guy de Maupassant novella.  Although this was only Cayatte's second film, he shows considerable flair and manages to extract the maximum dramatic impact from each scene - a case in point being the final confrontation between Baudu and his rival Mouret.  Like Zola, Cayatte's art is heavily informed by the artist's social conscience, and in much of his subsequent work Cayatte would lend his voice to several important social themes, particularly failings in France's judicial system.  Au bonheur des dames may not be as outspoken in its condemnation of societal ills as the director's later work, but it is an effective, indeed prescient, commentary on the power of big business to take over our lives and impose its standards on us all in the pursuit of mega-profits. It is Baudu, the unfortunate but doomed solitary shopkeeper (magnificently played by Michel Simon) that we identify with, not the faceless monolith of a department store that drives him to ruin.

Today, the film's title seems highly ironic (particularly if you are a feminist), but what is more chilling is its boldly pro-Pétainist ending, in which the workers' resistance and individuality are finally overcome by a seemingly benign dictator (Albert Préjean at his smoothest).  It is as if the Au Bonheur des Dames department store sees itself as the absolute embodiment of the Pétainist/Nazi dream - a society in which everyone knows his place and knuckles down to his job, without dissension and complaint.  The poor are happy to become marionettes, selflessly serving the preening bourgeoisie, and no one is remotely preoccupied with the crime of class segregation.  It is a Fascist Utopia in which the less privileged are conditioned to be content with being exploited by their rich masters.  Seventy years on, far from appearing dated, the film feels horribly pertinent.  The setting may be Zola's Paris of the 1860s, but the social reality it presents is pretty much what we find in our own time.  Today, our freedoms and individuality are threatened not by Nazis or any other misguided political ideology, but by a force that is far more potent and destructive, corporate greed.

Film Synopsis

Paris, 1860.  Baudu, an ageing shopkeeper, is none too pleased when a new department store named Au Bonheur des Dames opens on his doorstep and starts poaching his clientele.  In a desperate attempt to save his business, he drops his prices, but he merely drives himself further into debt.  Despite his straitened circumstances, Baudu is hospitable to his niece and nephews who turn up unexpectedly, looking for a place to stay after the death of their father.  Baudu is, however, appalled when his niece, Denise, finds works as a sales assistant at the rival store.  Octave Mouret, the store's ambitious owner, takes an instant liking to Denise, much to the annoyance of his mistress, Madame Desforges.  In an attempt to win back Mouret, Madame Desforges cons Baudu into giving away his shop to her, in return for a loan to pay off his present debts.  Ruined, Baudu suffers a second calamity when his daughter dies after the man she has fallen for rejects her.  Meanwhile, Mouret continues to plan the expansion of his empire...