Also known as
Children of Paradise
Lists
- ranked 24 in They Shoot Pictures, Don't They? 1000 Greatest Films (August 2005)
- ranked 24 in They Shoot Pictures, Don't They? 1000 Greatest Films (December 2006)
- ranked 24 in They Shoot Pictures, Don't They? 1000 Greatest Films (March 2006)
- ranked 32 in Total Film's 100 Greatest Movies Of All Time
- ranked 34 in Edward Copeland's Satyajit Ray Memorial Anything-But-Definitive List of Non-English Language Films
- ranked 42 in Chicago Tribune 100 Best Films of the Century
- ranked 51 in Entertainment Weekly's 100 Greatest Movies of All Time
- ranked 57 in Paul Schrader's Film Canon
- one of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die
- one of 101^w102 Movies You Must See Before...
- one of Guardian 1,000 films to see before you die
- one of Movieline's 100 Best Foreign Films
- one of The New York Times Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made
- one of TIME Magazine All-Time 100 Movies
Children of Paradise was pushed to the top of my list of films to see when a girl at a party mentioned that it was the topic of her honours thesis. The moral of this story is that shame in one's ignorance is a powerful motivator for learning: perhaps next time I'll have an intelligent comment to offer. Or, more likely, not; but it seems like an appropriate way to discover a film whose characters do so many silly things in the name of love or something like it.
Four men love Garance (Arletty), and all in different ways. Frédérick (Pierre Brasseur) is a consummate actor; even his private persona is constructed. There is no visible divide between what he feels and what he acts his character as feeling. He reminds of Cary Grant's famous admission that every man, even Cary Grant, wishes he could be [the image of] Cary Grant. �douard (Louis Salou) has such pride that, at times, it seems that he loves her as an ornament more than as a woman. Lacenaire's (Marcel Herrand) love is deeply confused with admiration: he spends the film trying to prove himself worthy. Baptiste (Jean-Louis Barrault), more than all the rest, seems to love her with all his heart and soul -- but Baptiste is a mime, and never says quite enough to truly fathom his motives, for all that he pours himself out in every movement and expression.
What makes Children of Paradise so magnificent? Even Marcel Carné notes that it's "a pretty straightforward story". There's no shortage of fodder for fancy-pants theoretical interpretation, like the self-conscious musings on problems of persona and spectator-spectacle relationship, or Jéricho the rag-man (Pierre Renoir) and his many names. But it's all subordinate to a story which is, in fact, pretty straightforward.
It seems to me that the film is charming because of its straightforward style. It's an epic. The American trailer compares it to Gone With the Wind, a comparison which seems appropriate only because of the similar scale. Both films try to portray life, in all its complexity, over such long periods of time that their characters can't help but develop. As we watch, they become like old friends. And when you're with old friends, there is no need for twists in the tale or feats of cleverness. Just being there is enough.