L'Enfant de Paris (1913)
Directed by Léonce Perret

Film Review

Léonce Perret was one of those early pioneers of film whose name has faded from the public consciousness but whose legacy endures as part of the foundation stone of cinema.  One of the most prolific and inventive filmmakers of his generation, he put his name (either as an actor or director, often both) to over five hundred films and was a significant player in the development of the language of cinema in its early years.  His main claim to fame is that he was one of the first directors (probably the first working for a major film studio) to insist upon crediting the director and his actors on the film, something which had been fiercely resisted by producers fearful that it might create a 'star system' similar to that found in the theatre.  Perret's importance is further bolstered by the fact that he was the man who directed Gaumont's first feature-length film, L'Enfant de Paris.

With a plot that borrows freely from literary sources that include Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist and Frances Hodgson Burnett's The Little Princess, L'Enfant de Paris created a template for the episodic crime-adventure film that was to prove hugely successful for Gaumont over the next decade.  Louis Feuillade's series of Fantômas films came not long afterwards, followed by his enormously popular serials, Les Vampires (1915) and Judex (1916).  Watching L'Enfant de Paris and Perret's next feature, Le Roman d'un mousse (1914), what is most apparent is how much more naturalistic and down-to-Earth Perret's films are compared with Feuillade's.  Perret and Feuillade shared the same penchant for fast-moving adventure and a similar affinity for the macabre, but whereas Feuillade's films are more sensational, with heroes and villains that appear to be endowed with almost superhuman qualities, Perret's are much more realistic, with characters who are far more recognisable as individuals we might meet in real life.  Perret's films also have more of an emotional centre, more warmth and humanity, whereas Feuillade's films tend to be more coldly mechanical, playing on our fascination with the darker, more unseemly aspects of the human psyche.  It would be simplistic to characterise Perret as an old-fashioned romantic and Feuillade as a cheap thrills merchant but these epithets are pretty well borne out by their contrasting adventure films.

L'Enfant de Paris offers far less in the way of narrative surprise than Feuillade's episodic films and, plot-wise, it is fairly pedestrian when you compare it with the head-spinning twists and turns of the Fantômas films or Les Vampires.  What makes the film so compelling and so rewarding is not its prosaic storyline but the sheer, unflagging creative flair shown by its director and his equally capable cinematographer, Georges Specht, another unjustly overlooked talent of the silent era, best known for his work on Marcel L'Herbier's L'Inhumaine (1924).  Both Perrier and Specht had a genius for visual storytelling that allowed them not only to overcome the limitations of the primitive technology at their disposal but also to push the envelope and introduce techniques which would later become very much a part of the basic grammar of filmmaking.

Perhaps the most consistent feature of Léonce Perret's films is their evenness and fluidity.  Even compared with films made today, Perret's cinema is distinguished by its effortless flow, with scenes melting almost seemlessly into one another without any of the jarring disconnections noticed in many silent films.  Instead of cutting from one scene in one room to another in an adjacent room, the camera pans gently from one room to the other, as if gliding miraculously through the wall that separates them.  When characters climb up or down, as they often do in Perret's films, the camera follows them, tracking vertically and so avoiding the need for an edit that may break the tension.  In one scene, there is a flashback in which the hero (Bosco) recalls with affection the kidnapped girl.  Rather than break the narrative flow with an edit, Perret inserts the flashback as a split screen, superimposing the remembered image to the right of the hero, as he had previously done on Le Coeur et l'argent (1912).

There isn't the brutal divide between studio interiors and location exteriors that we find (and have become accustomed to) in most films.  Instead, Perret sets up a kind of bridge between the two, with characters seen to move from interior to exterior, and vice versa, by placing a mock-up of the studio interior in front of the camera on an exterior shoot, or simply shooting the exterior through a door or window of a real interior.  The scarcity of inter-titles also helps the flow of the film, and when information needs to be conveyed to the audience, Perret is more likely to use a less distracting device - a written letter, newspaper article or telegram. 

Another thing to note is Perret's use of deep focus throughout the film, allowing him to make use of the full field of view and derive as much visual impact as he can from every part of the projected image.  Notice the detail in the cobbler's workshop, detail that reveals so much about the characters who inhabit it and avoids the need for explanatory titles.   Because every part of the field of view is in focus, characters are clearly visible as they move from the back of a scene to the front, creating a sense of visual drama without the need for a cut.  By such simple devices as these, Perret sustains the illusion of continuity for as long as he needs, and in doing so the world he project onto the screen is every bit as tangible as our own.  Now that we have grown accustomed to time and space being 'sliced and diced' by film editors obsessed with obliterating every last scintilla of superfluity and hasten the pace of the narrative, the more logical and consistent composition of Perret's films seems almost alien, and yet also strangely mesmeric.

Another of Perret's trademarks that is well represented in L'Enfant de Paris is the director's generous use of real locations for the exteriors.  This now provides a fascinating window into the past, showing us Paris and Nice (the film's two main locations) as they were in the dying days of the Belle Époque, when motor cars were outnumbered by horse-drawn vehicles.  Nice has never looked lovelier, a halcyon retreat yet to be spoiled by the urban development that would take place in the second half of the 20th century.  Specht's artistry lends the film some stunning panoramic shots of the coastal resort, but there is also a glimpse of the town's uglier side, the horrendous class divide that Jean Vigo would expose more vividly in his documentary À propos de Nice (1930).

The extensive location footage adds to the film's modernity but what makes it particularly accessible to a 21st century audience is the authenticity of the performances.  Rarely in Perret's films do we encounter the exaggerated theatricality that predominated throughout much of the silent era.  The characters tend to be well-drawn and convincingly played, with histrionic excess held in check even in moments of high drama.  The star of the film is 19-year-old Maurice Lagrenée, who (in his first credited role) plays the sympathetic cobbler's assistant Bosco.  The first thing we notice about Bosco is his slightly deformed appearance, and this tells us at a glance that the character is an unloved outsider who will form a natural fraternal bond with the kidnapped little girl, Marie-Laure (à la Orphans of the Storm).

With a face looking like that of a fat 50-year-old man in some shots, Marie-Laure is hardly a picture of innocence, and the limited range of the actress playing her does not help to endear her to the audience.  Rather, it is the kind-hearted, selfless and sometimes laughably gauche Bosco who monopolises our sympathies, and his journey, from put-upon servant to resourceful rescuer (in the Rouletabille or Fandor mould) is a helter-skelter ride of the most enjoyable kind.  After this promising feature debut, Lagrenée would enjoy a long and successful film career, best known for playing Inspecteur Grey in a series of four films in the 1930s.  In later years, he cropped up in Claude Autant-Lara's Le Diable au corps (1946) and Henri Decoin's Les Amoureux sont seuls au monde (1947).  Returning to L'Enfant de Paris, Émile Keppens, one of Perret's favourite actors, has an imposing presence as the little girl's father Pierre de Valen, after memorable appearances in Le Mystère des roches de Kador (1912) and Le Chrysantheme rouge (1912).  Another Gaumont regular, René Navarre, shows up briefly, just before he assumed his most iconic role as the baleful prince of crime in Louis Feuillade's Fantômas (1913).

Film Synopsis

Marie de Valen is devastated on receiving the news that her husband Pierre, an army officer, has been killed in his latest military exploit.  She takes to her bed and dies not long afterwards, leaving her five-year-old daughter Marie-Laure an orphan.  Not liking the orphanage into which she is placed, Marie-Laure runs away and ends up alone and friendless in the streets of Paris.  She is abducted by a crook, Le Bachelier, who places her in the care of a tyrannical cobbler, Tiron, and his hunchbacked assistant, Bosco.  Pierre de Valen turns out not be dead and on his return to France he is filled with anxiety on learning that his daughter has gone missing.  He offers a large reward if she is found and returned to him, and when Le Bachelier hears of this he wastes no time luring the military man into his den.  After forcing de Valen to give him two cheques for 50,000 francs, Le Bachelier flees with Marie-Laure to the south of France.  Bosco is not far behind, determined to rescue the little girl before any further harm befalls her...