By Steven Suskin
25 Dec 2011

	Cover art for "The Rules of the Game"

While we're in France, here comes "La regle du jeu," better known on these shores as The Rules of the Game [Criterion]. Jean Renoir saw his masterpiece as "an exact description of the bourgeoisie of our time"; the time being 1939, this was a shot at the French upper class at the very moment that it was about to be obliterated by the World War rolling towards the border. Renoir's vision was too close for comfort; the film was hooted and jeered, with offending sections almost immediately cut, and it was soon withdrawn. It didn't help — at a time when Hitler was already on the march — that Renoir's aristocratic Frenchman at the center of the film was Jewish, with an Austrian wife, and that his upper class characters were thorough fools. Renoir, in his 1974 autobiography "My Life and My Films," records that the 1939 Paris reaction was one of loathing; audiences found the film "too demoralizing."

History has treated "Rules of the Game" far better — it is frequently ranked high in the top ten on lists of the world's best movies. The original negative was destroyed during the War, but the film was restored — with Renoir's participation — in 1959. This full 106-minute version was remastered by Criterion for their stunning 2003 DVD release; this has been further enhanced for the new Blu-ray. As usual, Criterion's bonus material and the excellent booklet provide extra hours of analysis and interpretation of this most provocative film.

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	Cover art for "Design for Living"

More Paris — or at least movie studio Paris — comes from Criterion with Ernst Lubitsch's Design for Living. You note that I do not say Noel's Coward's "Design for Living." While the film shares the theme of Coward's 1933 menage a trois play, Lubitsch determined that the chemistry of the Coward-Lunt-Fontanne menage — in some ways reflecting their real-life relationship — was not quite replicable on screen. Thus the already celebrated director, with his celebrated touch, called in the already celebrated Ben Hecht to do a total rewrite. Coward's dialogue was jettisoned, as were the original characterizations.

Lubitsch and Hecht came up with a scintillatingly sophisticated romp, the sort of thing that convinced American puritans to come up with the Hays Code in 1934, effectively censored Hollywood movies. Design for Living — Coward's first play written specifically for Broadway — opened in late January 1933. Given Noel's lack of interest in performing an extended run and the Lunts' lack of interest in playing it with anyone other than Noel, it closed in May. (Even in the depths of the Depression, this brief engagement was a goldmine of Hugh Jackman proportions.) The curtailed-in-advance run allowed Paramount to rush the film into production, opening on Dec. 29 — just 11 months after the Broadway opening.

The different approach can be seen in the cast. Gilda was played by the glamorous Marion Hopkins, in place of the not-so-glamorous Fontanne. Otto, the painter, is now George, in the person of Gary Cooper; Leo, the playwright, is Tom, played by Fredric March (who had just won his first Oscar, in 1932, as "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.") Also on hand was Edward Everett Horton, in the built-up role of Max, the advertising executive; formerly Ernest, the art dealer.

Lubitsch agreed to film "Design for Living" on the understanding that he could make it into something vastly different from the play; thus, the two aren't comparable. I find the second considerably more entertaining than the first, which I think was hemmed in by Coward's necessity to write equally juicy roles and speeches for Lynn, Alfred and himself. For viewers who insist on comparing the two, the Criterion bonuses include a 1964 TV production from the ITV Play of the Week series. Introduced by Coward himself. Jill Bennett plays Gilda, with Leo in the hands of Daniel Massey, just back from the New York run of She Loves Me; and Otto played by John Wood, just prior to his journey to Broadway as Tom Stoppard's Guildenstern. Which does sound worth watching, eh?

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