L'Atalante (1934) on Netflix
NR19341h 29mComedyDramaRomance
Juliette, a village girl, marries Jean, skipper of the canal barge L'Atalante, and moves aboard with his crew, Père Jules and a cabin boy. Sailing for Paris, she craves the city's nightlife.
- Netflix4.4/5
- IMDb7.7/1018,831 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes100%
Trailer
Plot summary
Juliette, who has lived her whole life in a small provincial town, marries Jean, the skipper of the canal barge L'Atalante, and goes to live aboard with him. Two others share the vessel: Père Jules, an elderly sailor whose quarters are crowded with curios picked up on his travels, and a cabin boy. The three men are accustomed to a bachelor routine, and Juliette's arrival disturbs the harmony on board. Jean bursts into jealousy when he finds her talking with Père Jules in his cabin. Reaching Paris with a cargo, Juliette longs for a night in the city, and Jean has to stay aboard.
Cast
- Maurice Gillesas Le chef de bureau (office manager)
- Claude Avelineas (uncredited)
- René Blechas Best Man at Wedding
- Lou Boninas Passenger at Railway Station
- Genya Lozinskaas Fortune Teller
Show all 20 cast
- Gen Paulas Master of Ceremonies at Wedding
- Albert Riéraas (uncredited)
- Fanny Clairas Juliette's Mother
- Fanny Claras La mère de Juliette
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about L'Atalante (1934)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Vigo replaced Père Jules' pet dog in the script with more than ten alley cats supplied by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals; when Père Jules played his phonograph the cats surrounded it, so Vigo had his crew film them listening and sleeping inside the loudspeaker.
- Gaumont cut L'Atalante to 65 minutes and renamed it Le chaland qui passe, after a popular song of the time by Lys Gauty, which the studio also inserted into the film in place of parts of Maurice Jaubert's score.
- Because Gaumont insisted that music be included, the showman in L'Atalante sings "The Pedlar's Complaint", a French folk song written by Vigo, Goldblatt and Jaubert that makes fun of the kind of music they were forced to include.
- Michel Simon, then a lead actor after starring in Jean Renoir's Boudu Saved from Drowning, said he accepted his role in L'Atalante for the little-known and already controversial Vigo because he sympathized with him and wanted to help his troubled career.
- Already suffering from tuberculosis, Vigo fell ill with a fever during cold, wet location shooting and was bedridden for parts of the filming, but refused to take a break and often fought with executives at Gaumont.
- Vigo left every transition shot to the very end of filming, by which time the ground was covered in snow, so he shot many low-angle shots that showed only the sky in the background.
- L'Atalante became a favourite of French New Wave filmmakers, whose films contain many allusions to it; François Truffaut fell in love with it at the age of 14 in 1946, saying he was immediately overwhelmed with wild enthusiasm for Vigo's work.
