Pasteur (1923)
Directed by Jean Benoît-Lévy, Jean Epstein

Film Review

Louis Pasteur's contribution to the science of microbiology is so immense and far-reaching that no single work could ever hope to do justice to his immense achievements, which have genuinely shaped the course of human history for the better.  Today, a world without vaccines and anti-septic surgery would be inconceivable, and it is to Pasteur that humanity owes a debt of immeasurable gratitude for bringing us these precious life-saving boons.  Jean Epstein and Jean Benoît-Lévy's 1922 film documentary, commissioned to mark the first centenary of the scientist's birth, does a reasonably effective job at enumerating the key milestones in Pasteur's life and career, whilst paying a respectful tribute to him as both a great scientist and dedicated humanitarian.  The film, a compelling and highly informative work, is based on René Vallery Radot's authoritative biography La Vie de Pasteur, first published in 1911.
 
Epstein and Benoît-Lévy's Pasteur was French cinema's first attempt at a docudrama, in which episodes of Pasteur's life are included between factual descriptions of his work and discoveries.  In these, the adult Louis Pasteur is played by Charles Mosnier, a prominent actor of stage and screen who had previously appeared in many films by Max Linder and Albert Capellani.  (The actor died just two years after making the film at the age of 59.)  Given the sheer enormity of Pasteur's importance in the history of science, it is not surprising that his life has been celebrated in subsequent biographical films - first Sacha Guitry's Pasteur (1935) and then William Dieterle's The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936), with Pasteur portrayed by Guitry and Paul Muni respectively.  All three films are well worth watching for anyone seeking acquaintance with one of humanity's true heroes.

Pasteur (1922) has a special significance as it was the first film to be made by both of its directors, Jean Epstein and Jean Benoît-Lévy, who would each go on to become a major figure in French cinema throughout the following decade.  At the time, Epstein was far more interested in pursuing a literary career and his previous brush with cinema - working as an assistant to Louis Delluc on Le Tonnerre (1922) - had not been a particularly satisfying one.  It was through Paul Laffitte, the founder of the publishing house La Sirène at which Epstein had been employed as a secretary, that the 25-year-old future cineaste was brought into contact with Jean Benoît-Lévy, who was nine years his senior.

Jean Benoît-Lévy had just created his own film production company, Édition Française Cinématographique, which was committed to making educational films.  Before the war, Benoît-Lévy had gained valuable experience of the practicalities of film production at the leading French studios Pathé and Gaumont, having been encouraged by his uncle Edmond Benoît-Lévy, the proud owner of a public cinema in Paris.  With much of his output commissioned by various French ministries, Benoît-Lévy had an incredibly prolific career as a filmmaker, with over 300 films to his name (mostly shorts) on subjects of great social and public interest, from education and health to agriculture and farming.  On several of his films, he worked in collaboration with Epstein's younger sister Marie, their most notable achievements being the feature-length fictional dramas Peau de pêche (1929) and La Maternelle (1933).

Jean Epstein would also have a fruitful career as a maker of documentaries, most notably his series of portraits of Breton life, filmed in a part of France for which he would develop a close and lifelong attachment, Brittany - Mor'vran  (1931), L'Or des mers (1932) and La Bretagne (1936).  But it as an avant-garde pioneer of the 1920s that Epstein is most highly esteemed, his flair for innovation readily apparent in such cinematic marvels as Coeur fidèle (1923), La Glace à trois faces (1927) and La Chute de la maison Usher (1928).  None of this could have been foreseen at the time the director was working with Benoît-Lévy.  Epstein found the experience of making Pasteur thoroughly dispiriting.  Any creative input he had was severely restricted by the limitations imposed on him by the committee that had commissioned the film and insisted on controlling every aspect of its production.  Jean Epstein would gladly have given up cinema for good had it not been for the fact that Pathé was sufficiently impressed with Pasteur to approach the reluctant filmmaker with a ten year contract.  The offer of a secure job promising virtually unlimited resources and complete artistic freedom at a top Paris studio was not one that Epstein could turn down.  His stay with Pathé was far briefer than intended but it made him into a world-class film director.

Whilst Jean Epstein had good reason to resent the way in which his creativity was continually curbed on Pasteur the film is as much his as it is Benoît-Lévy's - the contrasting personalities and aesthetic qualities of both filmmakers are readily apparent in this, their one and only collaboration.  Benoît-Lévy's intense compassion for humanity - the signature theme of his entire oeuvre - is felt resoundingly throughout Pasteur, acknowledging and amplifying the human consequences of what the French scientist achieved through his selfless devotion to his work.  It was Benoît-Lévy who came up with the words for the film's postscript, offering a sobering reflection on man's tragic dual nature.  'Two opposing laws seem to be in conflict today - one law of blood and death..., and a law of peace, of work, of welfare which seeks only to deliver mankind from those ills that surround him.  One seeks only violent conquest, the other, the relief of humanity.'  When he wrote these words, Benoît-Lévy clearly had in mind the carnage of the First World War, but they still have a chilling resonance.  So little has changed in the intervening years.

Epstein's own distinctive imprint is at once noticeable to anyone familiar with his immaculately crafted documentaries.  The director's profound attachment to nature - so much a part of the fabric of his Breton poems - can be seen in the way he films everyday life in a rural setting, with an astonishingly modern sense of immediacy and intimacy.  The two-minute sequence in which Pasteur performs a rabies inoculation experiment on a live rabbit (at one point drilling into the poor creature's head) is both stomach-churning and fascinating. With its generous use of close-ups and narrative economy, the four-minute emotionally charged segment in which the scientist miraculously cures a boy of rabies is recognisably the work of the man who would immediately go on to make Coeur fidèle.  The abundance of inter-titles (an unavoidable necessity for a documentary without sound) does not diminish the film's visual impact, which owes everything to Epstein's innate ability to hold our attention with stark and powerful images.

Although it runs to just over fifty minutes, Pasteur has such a wealth of content that it feels like a thoroughly comprehensive treatment of its subject, pitching the material in a way that makes it highly accessible to both children and adults.  Artfully and sensitively crafted by two supremely gifted filmmakers at the start of their remarkable careers, this is educational cinema at it most enthralling and instructive, and to this day it remains as good an introduction to Louis Pasteur's life and achievements as any.

Film Synopsis

For a man who was destined to change the world more than any other human being Louis Pasteur came from the humblest of origins.  He was born in 1922 in the Jura region of France, the son of a poor tanner.  By sheer hard work and a thirst for knowledge, Louis laboured at his studies until, in 1843, he entered the École Normale Supérieure, where he began his research into crystals.  Entering the Faculty of Science in Lille, Pasteur began his groundbreaking work on fermentation, gaining knowledge that would prove to be of immense benefit to the wine and beer industries.  Appointed a director at the École Normale, he undertook research which conclusively disproved the theory of spontaneous generation and developed an alternative theory for the propagation of diseases based on the existence of microbes.  He showed how these harmful microscopic organisms could be eliminated by a process of sterilisation, a discovery that would revolutionise medical science.  After identifying the origin of a silkworm disease Pasteur was able to save France's ailing sericulture industry.

Now in his fifties, Louis Pasteur achieved an immense breakthrough in his understanding of how infectious diseases could be combated.  By isolating the anthrax bacterium, he was able to cultivate a weakened strain that could be used to inoculate sheep against a deadly and virulent disease.  Using the same technique, he found a way to protect chickens from cholera outbreaks.  Pasteur's greatest achievement was finding a vaccine for the uncurable disease rabies.  After successfully inoculating animals against the disease, he had the opportunity to try out a vaccine on a human volunteer, a boy named Joseph Meister who would almost certainly have died after being bitten by a rabid dog.  In 1892, Louis Pasteur achieved his life's dream with the foundation of the Pasteur Institute, an organisation that would continue his work into micro-organisms and vaccines long after his death.