Les enfants du paradis

One of the greatest classics of film history is a tribute to the theater as life’s stage. It’s 1827 and the Boulevard du Crime, the famous theater mile in Paris, is where the beautiful Garance (Arletty), mime artist Baptiste (Jean-Louis Barrault), womanizing actor Frédéric (Pierre Brasseur), the Count of Montray (Louis Salou) and crock Lacenaire (Marcel Herrand) all cross paths. An intricate dance of love and fate, intrigues, hopes and disappointments is spun around the impossible seeming love between Garance and Baptiste. LES ENFANTS DU PARADIS is regarded as the highwater mark of poetic realism as well as of the lengthy collaboration between Marcel Carné and screenwriter Jacques Prévert. (mg)