La Nuit de Varennes: Pt.2
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Back in 1992 French President Francois Mitterand selected two movies as representing what he considered to be the best cinematic approach to the French revolution. One was Jean Renoir's 1939 classic La Marseilles. The other was Italian director Ettole Scola's La Nuit de Varennes, a movie modelled on John Ford's famous 1939 western Stagecoach. And Ford's movie itself was based on a short story by the nineteenth century French author Guy de Maupassant.
The small town of Varennes has become famous as the place where in 1791 King Louis XVI, his wife Marie Antoinette and the royal children were captured as they attempted to escape their imprisonment at the hands of Parisian revolutionaries. Their escape attempt was made in a large and luxurious coach. But Scola's movie does not focus on the royal coach and its famous and ultimately doomed passengers. Instead he focuses on an entirely fictional coach carrying a mixture of actual historical figures and several fictional ones. This coach trails the royal family by a few miles and ends up in Varennes just after they have been detained in that town. |
The DirectorEttore Scola was an Italian director who worked alongside Fellini and Rosselini in Rome's famed Cinecitta Studios during the heyday of Italilian cinema from the 1950s to the mid- 1970s. He won the Best Director award at the 1976 Cannes Festival. His almost 40 films include 'A Special Day', 'Ugly, Diirty and Bad' and 'We All Loved Each Other So Much.'
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The ActorOne of the most intriguing aspects of the movie's casting was Marcello Mastroianni's performance as the famous but ageing Casanova, notorious and also admired for his libertine ways.
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The TemplateELa Nuit de Varennes is based on on John Ford's classic 1939 western, 'Stagecoach.' Ford's movie -itself based on a famous short story by de Maupassant - features a group of disparate travellers ( a gambler, a prostitute with a heart of gold, a pillar of society etc) flung together in a stagecoach on a journey that becomes increasingly dangerous.
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The Movie's Fictional Spin on the Royal Flight to Varennes
Scola's movie, like the actual historical event, is about a coachload of passengers and their journey, on 20-21 June 1791, to Varennes-en-Argonne, a small town split by the river Aire. The real-life passengers were KIng Louis XVI of France, his wife Marie-Antoinette and the royal children. Their intention: to escape their virtual imprisonment at the Tulieres Palace in Paris at the hands of the revolutionaries by fleeing to Montmédy in Lorraine, and there assemble forces to restore royal power. The passengers in La Nuit de Varennes, however, were certainly the royal family. Instead they were a mix of the fictional and the historical, and the varying purposes of their journey were entirely fictional.
The movie's historical figures included
The movie's historical figures included
Restif wrote "The Discovery of Australia by a Flying-Man", one of the first attempts at science-fiction.
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Restif de la Bretonne 1734 - 1806
A remarkable French author - and a notable printer by trade - who wrote over 200 novels, many of great length, as well as a range of political, social and economicnon-fiction.His work was very popular, not least because much of his fiction was salacious and packed with explicit detail. Some contemporary authors, jealous of his popularity (including the Marquis de Sade) mocked Restif as "the Rousseau of the Gutter" and "the Voltaire of the Chambermaids." Both his fiction and non-fiction portrayed the everyday life of peasants and Parisians, His novels specialised in depicting the demoralisation of naive and well-meaning country folk overwhelmed by life in Paris. His work was condemned and praised for its use of realistic detail, especially in sexual matters. Restif de la Bretonne’s books are notable for their accuracy of description, abundance of naturalistic detail, and clearly expressed democratic tendencies. A special place in Restif de la Bretonne’s enormous literary output(more than 200 volumes) is held by his book of literary sketches Parisian Nights, or the Night Spectator (1788–94), which is devoted to prerevolutionary and revolutionary Paris. In many ways it resembles a modern blog. Restif was a keen supporter of the Revolution, and participated in many of its events and controversies. His commentaries on the Revolution are a rich source of information for historians. In the movie Restif's character is on the run from some of his many creditors at the time. |
Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine was one of the leading intellectual figures in the revilutionary era of the late eighteenth Century. Born and educated in England, he played influential roles in both the American and the French Revolutions. Benjamin Franklin helped him emigrate to Amereica in 1774. His journalistic talents resulted in the 1776 best-selling pamphlet Common Sense, in which he condemned the British monarchy and government, and argued for American independence from Britain and the establishment of a republican system of government.
In 1787 Paine left the USA for Europe, and resumed his role as a revolutionary propagandist., eventually moving to Paris to participate in the revolutionary upheavals in France.
He was made an honorary citizen and even elcted to the revolutionary assembly, the Convention. But his opposition to the Terror and the execution of King Louis XVI was him arrested, imprisoned and condemened to death on trumped-up charges of treason. Only the intervention of US President James Monroe saved him. On his feturn to the USA Paine faded into eventual obscurity and poverty.
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In 1787 Paine left the USA for Europe, and resumed his role as a revolutionary propagandist., eventually moving to Paris to participate in the revolutionary upheavals in France.
He was made an honorary citizen and even elcted to the revolutionary assembly, the Convention. But his opposition to the Terror and the execution of King Louis XVI was him arrested, imprisoned and condemened to death on trumped-up charges of treason. Only the intervention of US President James Monroe saved him. On his feturn to the USA Paine faded into eventual obscurity and poverty.
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