La fille de l'eau (1925)

Director:

Jean Renoir

Writer:

Pierre Lestringuez (writer)

Release Date:

20 March 1925 (France)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Plot:

After the death of her father and her uncle had drunk all the heritage, Virginia is left alone. She...

Cast

  (Complete credited cast)

Pierre Champagne	...	Justin Crepoix
Charlotte Clasis	...	Madame Maubien
André Derain	...	Patron du 'Bon Coin'
Van Doren	...	Young lover
Madame Fockenberghe	...	Madame Raynal
Catherine Hessling	...	Virginia Rosaert
Pierre Lestringuez	...	Jef
Harold Levingston	...	Georges Raynal
Henriette Moret	...	La Roussette
Pierre Renoir	...	Farmer
Georges Térof	...	Monsieur Raynal
Maurice Touzé	...	La Fuine

Also Known As:

Whirlpool of Fate (UK) (USA)

Runtime:

71 min

Country:

France

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent

Movie Connections:

Featured in Jean Renoir: Part One - From La Belle Époque to World War II (1993) (TV)

Pedestrian melodrama

Renoir this picture may be, but it's no masterpiece; indeed, it's not particularly good.

The story gives the impression of having been cut down from a sprawling melodrama and crammed into too small a space, with highly-coloured events occurring in implausible and ultimately tedious sequence: the film is only about seven reels, but felt considerably longer to sit through by the end. There is no character development to speak of, the various individuals concerned being one-dimensional cardboard figures who pop in and out of the plot as convenient, and the leading lady is neither convincing as an adolescent nor, apparently, much of an actress. The male roles are fairly well-played within the limitations and stereotyping of the script, but Catherine Hessling all too often gives the impression of simply striking poses and painting on expressions to order.

The dislocated and arbitrary nature of the calamities that befall her verges at times on the bathetic, since practically no prefiguring takes place. If a man falls overboard, or a quarry opens up suddenly underneath her, or a family abruptly up sticks and move abroad lock, stock and barrel, then it is purely for the convenience of the plot. As others have commented, the most memorable sequence is that of the nightmare where she finds herself surreally beset by villains from earlier episodes; this experimentation was presumably where the director's heart lay. A little of this, however, goes a long way.

All in all, the film isn't even bad enough to be good. An actress of Mary Pickford's calibre might perhaps have pulled some successful emotional impact out of the twopenny plot, but failing any particular interest or sympathy for the central character (it's hard not to share La Fouine's impatience as she proves such a shrinking liability in her first poaching lesson) I felt this picture had little to offer. It tries for low humour; it tries for high drama; it tries for romance. It doesn't achieve a terribly impressive level in any of them.