The Marvelous Visit (1974)
One morning, the rector of a small French village comes across a young man, lying unclothed and unconscious on a deserted beach. Intrigued, the rector has the young man carried back to his home. When he awakes the stranger calmly identifies himself as Jean, an angel who has just arrived on Earth. Naturally, the rector doesn’t believe this, but decides to humour the young man. At first, Jean’s arrival in the village causes no upset. He is a harmless soul, full of good intentions and capable of only the kindest deeds. But then the villagers grow wary of him, and this wariness turns to outright hostility when Jean unwittingly causes an accident...
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One of my all time favorites.
I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.
Great Film overall
Best movie ever!
"la Merveilleuse Visite" was to be ,unfortunately,Carné's last movie:it stands as a cheapskate epitaph,a cardboard stone,a sad end to a career which produced some of the very best (and I mean it) works of the French cinema .Carné had planned another movie,"Mouche",based on the short novel by Guy De Maupassant:it promised a return to form,but the producers turned their back on him and Carné never got his wish.In 1942,Satan sent two of his devils to drive the humans to despair:the screenplay was written by Jacques Prévert and the actors were Jules Berry and Arletty.(Les Visiteurs Du Soir) In 1974,it's God's(?) turn :he sent an angel (or did the angel fall by accident?)in a village by the seaside in Britanny;there is nothing more to say about it:Gilles Kohler (debut)is bland,listless and it takes a lot of faith to believe he is a creature from Heaven;the vicar,his sacristan (played by the faithful Roland Lesaffre ,who is in all the post war works )who receive him in their home are dull uninteresting characters :the priest could have his moments of doubt and hope but as his help says "you do believe Jesus was born from a virgin ,that he rose from the dead,and you do not believe in that miracle!"To all the other villagers,the angel is no more than a village idiot (a role often played by Fernandel),who can play the violin though:but the sounds he produces are not even heavenly.Add A truck driver who gets jealous cause his girl goes for a stroll by the sea with the angel.NB:Carné's last movie was actually a MTV documentary:"La Bible";although an atheist,he was single-minded .
I have not yet seen this movie, but would like to add that, regarding how a previous review comments on this being 'an old story'... Indeed this is an old story! It was one of H G Wells earliest fantasy novels,in fact his second. First published in 1895, the same year as his first novel, "The Time Machine." Quite a few years before Spielberg or Truffaut! Compared to the rest of his canon, it is a slight, but enjoyable novel, containing some delicious observations on the follies and problems of society, a theme he would continue to write about, with varying degrees of hope and despair, up until his very last published works in 1945. Perhaps this offers some more perspective on the film. I will seek it out and find out for myself!
in this film marcel carne tries to show what happens when an angel falls on earth when a beautiful man falls nude on a french beach. He is very naive and everyone hates him for his beauty and his generosity and especially the boyfriend of a nice blond girl.Everyone knows what will happen and it wont be good (or may be it will) A story where love and good thoughts are always on the screen, nice for days of blues.
The angel paints the very grey village after a very grey funeral.My favorite line is when he talks to the priest about the villages belief in afterlife and why people do not celebrate when people die.