Pépé le Moko (Julien Duvivier, 1937) Pépé le Moko is a prime example of poetic realism. Sadly, I never attended film class, so I don't know jack sh*t about poetic realism. However, even my uneducated ass has seen enough films to recognize the influence, both thematically and technique-wise, that this 1937 French film had on the noir genre. Jean Gabin's suave anti-hero establishes an early mold for Bogart's most famous roles, and you can see the echoes of Gabin's style and demeanor reverberating decades later in the collaborations between Jean-Pierre Melville and Alain Delon. The titular character even provided the indirect inspiration for the narcissistic, love-obsessed skunk, Pepé le Pew.
The sloping labyrinth of the Casbah is both home and prison to notorious gangster, Pépé le Moko. Due to the maze-like network of interwoven pathways, safe houses and hidden passages, along with a populace that idolizes and protects him, authorities are unable to apprehend Pépé. Yet if Pépé exits this exotic enclave he exposes himself to incarceration for his past crimes. Complications arise when a Parisian beauty ignites within Pépé an insatiable desire to return to his beloved Paris, regardless of consequences. Unlike Bogart and Bergman in
Casablanca, a film which clearly owes a debt to
Pépé le Moko, having Paris as only a memory isn't enough.
From the start, every character, every romance, every dream, feels doomed to failure. A resigned sense of fatalism hangs over the proceedings. It's less the promise of tomorrow that fuels these characters, but rather the nostalgic longing of the past, and the flickering hope of reliving faded glories. This sentiment is best exemplified in one of the film's strongest, most melancholic scenes: A chanteuse sings along to a recording from her youth, her voice still just as lovely, but her weathered, beaten-down countenance a stark contrast from the radiant beauty forever young in the dusty photograph behind the gramophone.
Jean Gabin is deservedly iconic in the lead role. Impeccably dressed, smooth in demeanor, tough yet sensitive. The definition of debonair. Despite operating on the wrong side of the law, he possesses his own rigid set of principles. Men want to be him, ladies want to bed him, but do audiences root for him? I felt conflicted about that myself. As the film progresses, Pépé acts with increasing selfishness, his normal stoicism receding to impulsive recklessness. He also treats like crap the woman who loves him. Yet it's impossible not to feel some level of empathy for his character as malaise threatens to eat him alive. Pépé may not reside in a ten-foot cell with bars on the windows, but he's a prisoner nonetheless.
The Casbah setting is essentially a character in itself, providing the film with a unique atmosphere that's teeming with wildly interesting peoples from wide-ranging backgrounds and lifestyles. I was surprised to learn that only a few exterior shots were filmed on location, as the Casbah feels too big and authentic to be a studio recreation, so (fedora) hats off to the production team. I was also taken aback by how fresh the film feels despite its age. I assume the Hays Code didn't apply to foreign films, so it was refreshing to watch a 1937 film that wasn't bogged down with heavy-handed morality, as
Pépé le Moko glorifies its gangsters while painting the police as mostly incompetent. I'm now curious to watch the Hollywood remake,
Algiers, which also appears to be held in high regard, to see how many details had to be altered to appease the Hays Code.
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