91% (3)  Pépé le Moko  94 min,  Not Rated,  [Crime, Drama, Romance]  [Julien Duvivier]  [03 Mar 1941]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 77%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 100%,   Metacritic: 98%,   External Reviews
Awards:  2 wins.
Actors:  Fernand Charpin, Gabriel Gabrio, Jean Gabin, Saturnin Fabre
Writer:  Henri La Barthe (novel), Henri La Barthe (scenario), Julien Duvivier (scenario), Jacques Constant (adaptation), Henri Jeanson (dialogue)
External Links:  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb     Language:  French, Arabic    Country:  France
Plot:  Pépé le Moko is a gangster from Paris that hides in Algier's Casbah. In the Casbah, he is safe and is able to elude the police's attempts to capture him. But he misses his freedom, after two years in the Casbah. He meets a gorgeous Parisian tourist, Gaby, and they fall in love. Native inspector Slimane tries to use her to attract Pépé out of the Casbah in order to catch him.
Rotten Tomatoes:   In this film, Pepe le Moko is a well-known criminal mastermind who eludes the French police by hiding in the Kasbah section of Algiers. He knows that he is safe in this labyrinthine netherworld, where he is surrounded by fellow thieves and cutthroats.
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89% (2)  Marius  130 min,  Not Rated,  [Comedy, Drama, Romance]  [Alexander Korda]  [13 Apr 1933]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 79%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 100%,   External Reviews
Actors:  Alida Rouffe, Fernand Charpin, Pierre Fresnay, Raimu
Writer:  Marcel Pagnol (play), Marcel Pagnol (screenplay)
External Links:  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb     Language:  French    Country:  France
Plot:  César runs a bar along Marseilles' port, assisted by his 23 year old son, Marius. Colorful characters abound: M. Panisse, an aging widower and prosperous sail maker; Honorine, a fishmonger with a sidewalk stall near the bar; her daughter, Fanny, who helps her sell cockles; and, various old salts. Friends since childhood, Fanny and Marius love each other, but Marius has a secret wanderlust: every ship's whistle stirs a longing for foreign lands. When M. Panisse seeks Fanny's hand in marriage and when a departing clipper needs a deckhand, Marius and Fanny must decide who and what they love most. César, with his generous, comic spirit, tries to guide his son.
Rotten Tomatoes:   In this touching romance, the first in Marcel Pagnol's Marseilles trilogy (the other two being Fanny and Cesar, Pierre Fresnay stars as Marius, a young man tending bar who dreams of a life at sea. Because he so desires to become a sailor, he cannot commit to marriage even though he loves Fanny (Orane Demazis). When the rich Honore Panisse (Charpin) proposes to Fanny, Marius becomes enraged, but still refuses to ask for her hand. At the bar, Fanny confesses her love for him and tells Marius she has rejected Honore's proposal. Marius admits his love for her as well and they retire to a back room to make love. When Marius is told a spot has opened up on a departing ship, he declines to sign on, not wanting to leave Fanny, but he still refuses to marry her. Fanny overhears the conversation, and not wanting to hold Marius back from the life at sea he so desires, tells Marius she has changed her mind and accepted Honore's proposal. Heartbroken, Marius rushes to pack and catch the departing ship. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi
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88% (2)  César  168 min,  Not Rated,  [Drama]  [Marcel Pagnol]  [27 Oct 1948]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 77%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 100%,   External Reviews
Actors:  Fernand Charpin, Orane Demazis, Pierre Fresnay, Raimu
Writer:  Marcel Pagnol
External Links:  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb     Language:  French    Country:  France
Plot:  Honoré Panisse is dying, cheerfully, with friends, wife, and son at his side. He confesses to the priest in front of his friends; he insists that the doctor be truthful. But, he cannot bring himself to tell his son Cesariot that his real father is Marius, the absent son of César, Cesariot's godfather. Panisse leaves that to Fanny, the lad's mother. Dissembling that he's off to see a friend, Cesariot then seeks Marius, now a mechanic in Toulon. Posing as a journalist, Cesariot spends time with Marius and leaves believing tales he is a petty thief. Only after the truth comes out can Marius, Fanny, César, and Cesariot step beyond the falsehoods, benign though they may be.
Rotten Tomatoes:   The final entry in French filmmaker/playwright Pagnol's Marseilles trilogy (preceded by Marius and Fanny) that chronicles life in Provence, this drama centers on an 18-year-old's search for his biological father Marius who returns to rekindle his romance with Fanny.
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88% (2)  Fanny  125 min,  [Comedy, Drama]  [Marc Allégret]  [12 Feb 1948]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 77%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 100%,   External Reviews
Actors:  Fernand Charpin, Orane Demazis, Pierre Fresnay, Raimu
Writer:  Marcel Pagnol (play), Marcel Pagnol (screenplay)
External Links:  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb     Language:  French    Country:  France
Plot:  Marius has left, signed up for a five year hitch on a ship bound for the Indian Ocean. In his few letters to his father César, he hardly mentions Fanny. When she finds she is pregnant, she considers her options: suicide, to raise the child on her own, to wait for Marius, or to marry Honoré Panisse, the older merchant who seeks her hand. These choices are emotional: to raise a bastard, to trust in Marius' eventual return, to believe he'll want to marry her, to save her mother from shame, to fool Panisse, to give her child a name. In scenes dramatizing Fanny's honesty, she talks to her mother, then Panisse, César, and later Marius, and she makes her choices.
Rotten Tomatoes:   In this sequel to Marcel Pagnol's Marius, which picks up roughly where the first film left off, sailor Marius (Pierre Fresney) has left for the sea, while his girlfriend Fanny (Orane Demazis) is pregnant with his child. Through she still loves Marius, Fanny bows to the pleas of her parents and agrees to marry Panisse (Fernand Charpin), an elderly sail maker, so that her baby will have a name and a father at home. Marius' father Cesar (Raimu) tries to keep Fanny's marriage and the child that Marius fathered a secret from him, but to no avail; when Marius learns of Fanny's predicament, he comes home as quickly as possible. While Marius and Fanny want to reconcile, Fanny's parents will hear nothing of it, and Panisse refuses to give Fanny up, declaring that while he is not the biological father of the child, the baby is his son in every other sense. With a heavy heart, Cesar advises his son to return to the life of the sea, and a heartbroken Marius follows his father's advice. Pagnol concluded his "Marseilles Trilogy" three years later with Cesar.
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87% (2)  The Baker's Wife  133 min,  Not Rated,  [Comedy, Drama]  [Marcel Pagnol]  [26 Feb 1940]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 75%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 100%,   External Reviews
Awards:  3 wins.
Actors:  Fernand Charpin, Ginette Leclerc, Raimu, Robert Vattier
Writer:  Jean Giono (novel)
External Links:  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb     Language:  French    Country:  France
Plot:  In this little Provencal village, a new baker, Aimable, settles down. His wife Aurelie is beautiful and much younger than he. She departs with a shepherd the night after Aimable produces his first breads. Aimable is so afflicted that he can not work anymore. Therefore, the villagers, who initially laughed at his cuckoldry, take the matter very seriously (they want the bread) and organize a plan to find Aurelie and to bring her back to the bakery.
Rotten Tomatoes:   The Baker's Wife (La Femme de Boulanger), though based on a novel by Jean Giono, was specially tailored by writer/director Marcel Pagnol for the talents of the incomparable Raimu. The star plays the new baker in the French community of Provence. One of Raimu's first customers is shepherd Charles Moulin, who is immediately smitten by the middle-aged baker's young, toothsome wife Ginette LeClerc. In short order, Ginette runs off with Moulin, a turn of events that the stubborn Raimu refuses to acknowledge. As he grows more taciturn, he neglects his work, and soon the whole village anxiously awaits the wife's return, else they'll never see another loaf of bread. The local Marquis (Charpin) takes matters in hand by leading the townsfolk in a search party for the wayward wife. The charms of The Baker's Wife are both captivating and fragile; an attempt in 1976 to turn the property into a Broadway musical proved the fragility by ignoring the charm. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
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