THE CRIME OF MONSIEUR LANGE

One of Jean Renoir’s lesser known films, THE CRIME OF MONSIEUR LANGE is something of a hidden gem these days but in 1936 it was the film that truly brought the director forever to the front ranks of French filmmakers. Monsieur Lange is a publishing house clerk who writes cheap Western novels in his spare time. When his untrustworthy boss, Batala, avoids his debt collectors by pretending to be dead, Lange and his co-workers take over the business themselves and thrive on the popularity of Lange’s pulp stories until Batala returns to demand his share of the profits.

The film captures the climate of 1930’s France, as the Popular Front, a leftist coalition of political parties, labor unions and cultural organizations, was preparing to (briefly) take power. This film began Renoir’s socially and politically engaged work of the era, but this reductive take on the film does little to communicate the charm and liveliness that embraces not only the villainous boss and the title character but the community that surrounds them. From his silents through his earlier sound films, Renoir had been working towards a movie like this, one that seemed to have all his qualities at once, and realized in a way that feels at once relaxed and concise. He infuses this captivating story with a rich weave of nuance and feeling that remains ageless.

“This was Renoir’s unique, and quite spectacular, strength: linking narratives of complex human beings to progressive sociopolitical readings. And THE CRIME OF MONSIEUR LANGE is an exemplum of this skill with unsurpassed charm to boot. Jacques Prévert’s screenplay is so light on its feet, so “French,” what with its whimsy and deep romance and periodic invocations of the spirit of ‘liberté, égalité, fraternité.’ This is the sort of film that leaves one, smiling, with the conviction that sometimes crime does indeed pay.” - Zach Campbell, Slant