The Life of Emile Zola - 1937

HERS -

This was a very interesting movie once it got rolling. The first 1/2 hour to 45 minutes seemed like a complete movie in itself. It was all about Zola’s life and covered many years in a short period of time. This movie is a biopic which we learned is a movie that is a biography. Zola was a writer and wrote about injustices in Paris in the late 1800’s including political, class structure and personal injustices. He became very famous and rich and got lazy and his drive went away. The second two thirds of the movie introduced the injustice that brought his drive and fighting spirit back into his life.

The characters did a good job. There was only one character that was too melodramatic. Zola looked like Brad Pitt with his goatee thing he has going. I particularly enjoyed the wife of Dreyfus (the army officer who was framed and sent to Devil’s Island as punishment). She was a strong woman who stood by her man and did everything she could do to fight to get his name cleared. She even went to Zola to convince him to write about her husband.

Although I think this was overall a good movie, I am a little confused as to why it won the Best Picture award. There was nothing in the movie that set it apart to me. Still looking forward to 1939 when we get to watch a movie in color!

HIS -

Well, it's been awhile since we've watched something from our list...oh well, the best laid plans and all that.

We returned to our list with this biopic which was loosely based upon a true story. When we first began watching this, I almost regretted doing this project and thought that the quality of movies had regressed since the last movie we watched (Mutiny on the Bounty - I know, I know, we didn't write our thoughts on that one yet). Within the first 10 minutes or so, I looked at Lisa with one of those "You've got to be kidding" looks as it seemed like this was going to be one of those melodramatic type movies with all kinds of overacting ahead that would make two hours seem like 12.

Then it changed and drew us in after a fast forward in time. Zola went from the young, starving and cold artist to the more plump and wealthy older man that had profited from his writings over the years about the human condition in the latter part of 19th century France. I didn't think I'd like the movie, but I ended up not minding it. Typically I'm not a fan of movies that portray "the establishment" as all evil and corrupt and I thought this is what the movie would be like. Ultimately, the story was about justice of which I am a fan. It's the false justice I abhor and many stories and some movies portray just that - a twisting of the facts to advance an agenda (can anyone say "man-made global warming"?) and call it justice when evil, in fact, reigns.

I liked the older Zola as portrayed by Paul Muni rather than the younger version of the character. I thought Dreyfus was well played by Schindkraut in the first part of the role. The wife of Zola was sweet and unassuming, but I felt sorry for her as I could picture her thinking "It's all my fault!" as she sat at her husband's funeral.

Hmmm...will it be Gone With the Wind or The Great Ziegfeld next?