L'Esclave blanche (1939)
Directed by Marc Sorkin, Georg Wilhelm Pabst

Film Review

In purely narrative terms, there's little to distinguish L'Esclave blanche from the morass of tacky exotic trash that cinema audiences were apparently hooked on in the 1930s - tales of intrigue and romance in foreign lands that few westerners could ever hope to visit except in their dreams, all serving to remind us all of the superiority of the western way of life.  Thankfully, much of this cliché sodden mass of flagrantly xenophobic drivel has been lost in the mists of time, hopefully never to be rediscovered by even the most dedicated and broad-minded of film enthusiasts, but some have remained, justifying their preservation more on account of their artistic qualities than their dubious content.  L'Esclave blanche is one such film - and probably better than most in that it doesn't overplay the moral superiority card or fall back on all those egregious stock clichés.  Indeed, its blacked-up 'villains' are hardly villains at all - just poor misguided souls who have signed up to a different set of values to the ones that we in the West take for granted and which we know to be better.  (Pause for cringe.)

L'Esclave blanche certainly has its faults.  Many faults. There is scarcely a scene in the film that rings true and the story's premise is so dodgy, its racism so blatant, that you can't help feeling nauseous long before the 'Fin' caption appears and puts this glib round of Middle East culture bashing to bed.  And yet, horrible though the film is to anyone who is not a fully paid up member of the Front National, it does have its artistic merits.  With its ornate, authentically crafted sets and boldly expressionistic photography it is as moody and seductively stylish as any other French film of this era. The film looks stunning from start to finish, and it feels like an act of wanton sacrilege that such sublime artistry was not matched by a script of comparable skill.

Marc Sorkin is credited as the film's director (assisted by Jacqueline Audry, who would later become a director of some renown), but there is hardly a shot in the film that does not carry the unmistakable signature of G.W. Pabst.  One of the great film stylists of the period, Pabst was engaged (if you believe the credits) as a mere supervisor on the film, but you can't help feeling that he made a far bigger contribution than that implies.  Sorkin had already worked for Pabst as an editor and assistant, on such films as Die freudlose Gasse (1925) and Die Büchse der Pandora (1929), and this was the last of four films he directed.  We shall never know exactly how much artistic input Pabst had in L'Esclave blanche, but anyone familiar with his work could easily mistake it for one of his own films - its relentlessly oppressive atmosphere and overt female slant (a feminist perspective that was clearly ahead of its time) suggest as much.

If there is one reason to watch this film it is Viviane Romance's performance.  Habitually cast as the vamp and other assorted women of easy virtue, Romance had a raw sex appeal that was virtually unrivalled in French cinema of the 1930s, but she was also a compelling actress and brought a crushing sense of reality to any role that came her way, no matter how dire the film.  Romance's authentic portrayal is just about the only thing that prevents L'Esclave blanche from collapsing under the weight of its crassness and absurdity - most of the rest of the cast either couldn't be bothered or else mistake it for a silly piece of pantomime.  There is nothing remotely credible in the character that Romance is saddled with - she travels to Turkey expecting to find herself in an Arabian Nights fantasy, is surprised that women in this benighted land are treated like cattle, and then decides to hotfoot it back to Paris when the man to whom she had promised eternal devotion dares to accept a second wife from his ruler.  It would take an actress of exceptional ability to make any of this plausible but Viviane Romance does just that, and it is only when you sit down afterwards and examine her character that you realise what a superb confidence trick she has pulled.

John Lodge, by contrast, makes no attempt to redeem the film.  Capable actor though he was - as he showed in Maurice Tourneur's Koenigsmark (1935) - his heart evidently wasn't in serving such dross as this and you can see why he gave up acting to take up politics, a much easier (and saner) profession.  (Curiously, he ended up as a diplomat, not too far removed from the character he plays so unconvincingly in this film.)  Marcel Dalio, to his credit, shows none of Lodge's apathy but looks like a man who is happily under the misapprehension that he is in a Feydeau farce or American film comedy.  His canine-obsessed, light bulb-shooting, pathologically misogynistic Sultan is certainly the kind of comedy grotesque you'd be more likely to find in a Marx Brothers films than a big budget French period melodrama, and in the former setting you might even warm to his face-pulling histrionic excesses.  In L'Esclave blanche, alas, the excessively made-up Dalio disgraces himself badly, and it is only the surfeit of bad acting that surrounds him which allows him to escape with his dignity intact.  Other than Romance, the only member of the cast who appears to be taking the film seriously is Saturnin Fabre - but then he was always the consummate professional and was never a man to allow a bad film to get in the way of a great performance.

Film Synopsis

In the early 1900s, a Turkish diplomat Vedad Bey returns to his home country, accompanied by his young French wife Mireille.  On the train to Constantinople, Mireille helps a Turkish revolutionary Mourad to evade capture.  It is not long after her arrival in Turkey that the free-spirited French woman realises it is nothing like the exotic paradise she had imagined.  She is coldly received by her mother-in-law, who advises her that it is her duty to obey her husband in all things, and is appalled to learn that her fourteen-year-old sister-in-law is already given in marriage to a man old enough to be her grandfather, the chief of police Djemal.  Her impromptu appearance at a reception attended by her husband causes outrage - how dare a woman show so such disrespect for local customs!  The tyrannical Sultan reacts to this offence by offering Vedad Bey a second wife, a gift that further widens the rift between Mireille and her husband.  Knowing that she cannot live in such a barbaric country, Mireille makes a desperate bid to flee back to France and begs Mourad, the man whose life she once saved, to help her.  The escape is thwarted by Djemal's men and Mireille is soon on her way to the Sultan's palace.  The Sultan shows mercy and allows Mireille safe passage back to France, provided she makes no attempt to contact her husband.  When he discovers that his wife in on her way back home, Vedad Bey makes up his mind to give up everything and accompany her.  The Sultan is far from pleased by this betrayal and orders the arrest of both Bey and his wife.  They will not leave his country alive...