À Nous la Liberté (1931)
"À nous la liberté" (original title)

A famous left-wing satirical comedy about two ex-convicts, one of whom escaped jail and then worked his way up from salesman to factory owner, where he oversees a highly mechanized ... See full summary »

Director:

René Clair

Writer:

René Clair (story)

Stars:

Henri Marchand, Raymond Cordy, Rolla France

Nominated for 1 Oscar. Another 3 wins.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Henri Marchand	...	Émile
Raymond Cordy	...	Louis
Rolla France	...	Jeanne
Paul Ollivier	...	L'oncle (as Paul Olivier)
Jacques Shelly	...	Paul
André Michaud	...	Le contremaitre
Germaine Aussey	...	Maud - la femme de Louis
Léon Lorin	...	Le vieux monsieur sourd
William Burke	...	L'ancien détenu
Vincent Hyspa	...	Le vieil orateur

Storyline

A famous left-wing satirical comedy about two ex-convicts, one of whom escaped jail and then worked his way up from salesman to factory owner, where he oversees a highly mechanized operation where the workers are reduced to mere automatons. Fearful of being exposed over his past, at first by his friend and later by another gangster, the owner chooses to give his factory to the workers, then escapes with his friend to the freedom of the open road. The production company for "A Nous la Liberte" was for more than a decade embroiled in a lawsuit claiming that Charles Chaplin had seen their film and plagiarized many ideas from it as he developed "Modern Times."

---

Plot Keywords:

factory | escape | friend | freedom | prison | 

---

Taglines:

Le chef-d'oeuvre de René Clair

---

Genres:

Comedy | Musical

---

Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

France

Language:

French

Release Date:

31 December 1931 (USA)

Also Known As:

À Nous la Liberté

Company Credits

Production Co:

Films Sonores Tobis

Technical Specs

Runtime:

104 min 83 min (re-release)

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.20 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

When Charles Chaplin's Modern Times premiered, the original distribution company of À nous la liberté, Tobis, wanted to sue. Director René Clair refused to join such a suit, saying that he considered it a compliment if Charles Chaplin based his film on René Clair's, but the suit went ahead nevertheless. Tobis, sued United Artists and Charles Chaplin for plagiarism. The suit, with separate segments in France and in the US, went on for more than a decade, right through WWII. Charles Chaplin, at the request of his lawyers, finally settled, but never admitted to the charge. René Clair stayed aloof from the affair, and he and Charles Chaplin, whom he greatly admired, remained friends.

---

Quotes

[first lines]
[Voice over Singer]: Liberty is the happy man's due / He enjoys love and skies of blue / But then there are some / Who no worse crimes have done / It's the sad story we tell / From a prison cell

---

Connections

Featured in Fejezetek a film történetéböl: A francia lírai realizmus (1989)

User Reviews

Classic French masterpiece.

Sobering indeed that this innovative and quite unique early French "talkie" has garnered but four reviews. This is akin to the Cistine Chapel going six months without visitors!

As any student of early film would have discovered, the premise of "A Nous La Liberte" was undoubtedly "lifted" and used by Chaplin in his revered MODERN TIMES. Others have mentioned this aspect.

The film is a satirical comment, almost a control experiment from one viewpoint, focusing on the ideology of big business, and in regard particularly to newly gestated industrial technology, just how the individual is viewed as little more than a means to an end. A resource to be used and no more. Clair poses the question, is the worker..the LITTLE man - any more or less a free-thinking and needful entity than the embittered prisoner serving out his time?

The film follows the fortunes of two ex-cons. One makes it to the top of the industrialised ant-hill, the other makes it to the nearest sheltered alleyway or park bench. Whilst Clair experiments freely here with music and song, the Metropolis-like buildings lend a sombre note to the proceedings at hand.

Stylistically dated perhaps now, and the humor betrays its thirties origins, nevertheless at its core the observations made still hold true. This remains a critically important cinematic benchmark not just in terms of early French cinema but also in terms of a director's extraordinary vision so many years ago.