Aventure Malgache *** (1944, Paul Bonifas, Paul Clarus, Jean Dattas) – Classic Movie Review 7102

Alfred Hitchcock’s second British wartime propaganda short film in French Aventure Malgache (1944) was made immediately after Bon Voyage and was again filmed by him for the British Ministry of Information.

Hitchcock recalled ‘It was important to me to do something’ for the war effort, but his film was suppressed by the British government after disagreements at the time and has been rarely seen since until it was shown again in the Nineties when the two films were restored by the British Film Institute, and released on on DVD and VHS by Milestone Films.

Hitchcock turned the inner conflicts he had found among the Free French on Bon Voyage into the subject of the new film. In the wartime Axis-controlled French colony of the island of Madagascar, a leading French lawyer becomes a Resistance hero, clashing with the nasty Vichy police chief official, the Chef de la Sûreté, (Paul Bonifas), and undermining the Vichy regime.

Now an actor talking with his fellow Molière Players as they put on their makeup for a show, Paul Clarus (played by ‘Paul Clarus’) tells his cast mates about his adventure, and the film unfolds in flashback.

A must-see for Hitchcock completists, it is always fascinating and entertaining, both for the story and its characters, as well as for its World War Two detail, though allowances have to be made for its tiny budget, amateurish acting and wartime filming.

Hitchcock said: ‘One of the men was an actor and lawyer in his sixties always at odds with his companions, who finally threw him into jail. It was a true story and he told it himself.’

So it is generally thought that the film is based on the real-life activities of lawyer Jules François Clermont, who wrote the story and starred in the film as ‘Paul Clarus’. However, the actor Claude Dauphin also worked with Hitchcock in narrating his own experiences of operating an underground radio station in Nazi occupied France.

It is made in French and shown with English subtitles.

The actors from The Molière Players are Paul Bonifas as Michel, the Chef de la Sûreté, Paul Clarus [Jules François Clermont], Jean Dattas, Andre Frere, Guy Le Feuvre and Paulette Preney.

Aventure Malgache [Malagasy Adventure] is directed by Alfred Hitchcock, runs 30 minutes, is produced by the Ministry of Information and Phoenix, is written by Angus MacPhail, based on the story by Jules François Clermont, is shot in black and white by Günther Krampf, is scored by Benjamin Frankel, and is designed by J Charles Gilbert.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7102

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