Events

New restoration of Julien Duvivier's classic French film noir.

In the end-of-the-tramway-from-Paris suburb Villejuif (you do the translation), suspicion and gossip run rampant.  Immediate:  last night’s murder of an old maid in that vacant lot near the church.  Ongoing: bearded, aloof shutterbug Michel Simon’s Monsieur Hire (real name: the “foreign”-sounding Hirovitch).  Is he a peeping tom? A pervert? Not the ideal spot for back-from-the-slammer Viviane Romance to start a new life – but then there’s sleazy old flame Paul Bernard hanging around. (Did she take the rap for him?) And her very open window is just across from Hire’s – who proves to have another life, even as two blind loves take their course. Long unseen anywhere, Duvivier’s first film back in France after a WWII Hollywood stint has steadily gained stature, not least because it's that rare thing: an adaptation of Belgian crime titan Georges Simenon that’s actually darker than the original (his novel Mr. Hire’s Engagement), with its final shot, amid the village carnival that must still go on, the most callous – and doomed – thrill ride in film history. DCP restoration. Approx. 91 mins.