小丽丝

Jean Grémillon’s first talkie, the 1930 LA PETITE LISE, is anything but talky. While openingand closing with soulful afro-Latin strains, something just above silence reigns throughoutthe film. Grémillon is already orchestrating the auditory menace of nuanced sound sculptingthat would later pervade REMORQUES (1941), setting forth evolving rhythmic figures at anatmospheric whisper. Grémillon grafts this aural frieze onto smoldering b&w photography.Truly, the frame is often smoking for purposes of motif.In truth, this film has the most impressive use of sound I know of, including Bresson’sMOUCHETTE. It’s up for speculation as to how much technical issues played into hiscreative use of sound and off-screen. What is of particular note is that instead of milking thecapability of sync sound dialogue, Grémillon uses it very sparingly, increasing the range ofexpressiveness. An abstract score of atmospheric insinuation is always in accompanimentwith the imagery tonally, rhythmically and dynamically. Listening carefully, ambient sound isever at work in a subliminal music score.The story of LA PETITE LISE belongs to the sandbox of melodrama, but Grémillon grinds itinto expressionistic minimalism. What is this story? Perhaps it will suffice to say that it isthe reunion of a father fresh out of prison with his daughter now grown up, all preparedunder a pressure cooker of lens and mic. Conflagrations arise periodically from the embersof troubled quiet, with lighting flickering to and from peaks of intensity. Emblazonedgestures extend from the sustain of affective brood, while conversations flare up beforesubsiding back into the simmering cauldron.