Director: René Clair
Written by: René Clair
Starring: Henri Marchand, Raymond Cordy, Rolla France & Paul Ollivier.
Runtime: 95 minutes
“À nous, à nous la liberté” is the musical refrain of the prison cellmates Émile (Henri Marchand) and Louis (Raymond Cordy) as they long for freedom from their miserable internment. Following a partly bungled escape plan which sees only one of them escaping, that chorus of their shared dream of “liberty for us”, is quickly forgotten as Louis forges for himself a life as a successful and wealthy businessman, in the process losing sight of his former prison pal, Émile.
René Clair’s insightful caper comedy of friendship reunited and life’s ability to get in the way of those connections we share becomes a warm embrace of the power of friendships and the ties that bind us together, regardless of where life takes us.
In his early silent film career, René Clair had specialised in fantasy films that carried comedy as a tone throughout and in many ways À nous la liberté continued along his thematic strengths. Playing out almost as an incarcerated prisoner’s dream of freedom and the outside world, the comedy emanates from the two friends’ natural chemistry and the clash of cultures of the new social worlds they find themselves in post prison life.
Almost every film’s success, regardless of genre, is reliant on good chemistry and cohesion being formed between the leading protagonists on screen, but it’s especially true when applied to comedy. Despite the wedge driven between the two lead men by Louis’s successful entrepreneurial ventures, Marchand’s Émile and Cordy’s Louis continue to possess an endearingly likeable on-screen brotherhood.
What Clair does so well is show the two men as the different characters they are; the smart, driven and successful Louis, able to play the social chameleon, adapting his character to his various surroundings; and Émile, a more hapless, bumbling social outcast but with a genuine heart and lovable loyalty to his friend.
It is Émile’s inability to really fit into society or the workplace or have any real understanding of the social graces expected of him that really gives the film its comic heart but it’s his friendship and lasting brother in arms connection with Louis that is the film’s triumphant overarching spirit.
As with popular comedy double acts like Laurel & Hardy, À nous la liberté carries a theme that friendship, however unlikely or unconventional, is the ultimate representation of liberty. Louis learns this after stepping down from his lucrative business empire for life on the road with a knapsack slung over his shoulder and the companionship of his old friend by his side.
Through The 4th Wall 