A jealous general, a mirror, and a bullet that hits the wrong target — twice.
General Mikailoff once killed a lieutenant he mistakenly believed to be his wife's lover. Subsequently, she meets Henri de Cassel, so different from her drunkard husband, becomes his mistress and agrees to flee with him. She is surprised by her husband who, dead drunk, shoots the young man's reflection in the mirror.
Acting
Arletty steals scenes as Emma with mere minutes of screen time.
Direction
Schiller's mirror shot is devastating in its pathetic irony.
Director
Paul Schiller
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Arletty would become France's biggest star within five years, making this a fascinating glimpse of her raw early talent.
Released as Europe marched toward war, the film's atmosphere of doomed aristocrats drinking themselves to destruction feels eerily prophetic.
FR
