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Cult Review
Senior Film Conservator
Alright, so you’re looking at La femme du voisin, and let’s be real: this one isn't for your average Friday night popcorn crowd. If you're someone who needs fast cuts and a plot that moves at warp speed, you’ll probably find yourself checking your watch every few minutes. But if you’re into the delicate, sometimes exaggerated art of early silent films, if you appreciate how much actors could say with just a tilt of the head, then yeah, give it a shot. It's a real time capsule. Anyone else? You might be bored stiff. 🕰️
Jacques de Baroncelli, he really knew how to frame a scene, even back then. There’s this one part, I remember it distinctly, where Suzy Pierson’s character just *looks* at something off-camera for what feels like an eternity. It’s not a big event, just her eyes. But you can almost feel the weight of whatever she's thinking. It sticks with you. Like, what is she seeing? What is she *wishing* for? 🤔
The pacing is something else entirely. Modern films could never get away with it. There are these moments where a character just *stands* there, or walks really, really slowly across a room. You can almost feel the movie trying to convince you this moment matters, even if nothing dramatic is happening. It makes you lean in, though, trying to figure out the subtext.
André Roanne, as the husband, he has this very specific kind of weary look. It's not outright sadness, more like a dull ache. You see it in his shoulders, how they slump just a little. Not every performance in silent films hits you like that, but his did. It felt very human, even without a single word spoken.
And then there’s Fernand Fabre, the neighbor. He carries himself differently. More upright, almost too confident. There’s a scene where he’s just standing in a doorway, observing. The shot lingers, and his gaze feels a bit too intense. Not overtly menacing, but definitely a little unsettling. It’s *that* kind of quiet tension that holds the film together.
The intertitles, you know, the text cards? Some of them are just plain descriptive, telling you what's happening. But then others… they try to get a bit poetic. One line, it was something about a 'heart's quiet yearning.' It felt a little over the top, honestly, but also kind of charming in its earnestness. Like they really believed in the *grandeur* of these emotions. 😂
You can tell they put a lot of thought into the sets, even the small details. I noticed a particular vase on a mantelpiece in one of the indoor scenes. It wasn’t just a prop; the light caught it just so, making it stand out. It’s those little things that build a world, even if it's a very simple one.
Suzy Pierson's expressions are the real showstopper here. Every emotion is dialled up, as you'd expect from silent cinema. Sometimes, it’s almost comical to a modern eye, but then she’ll hit you with a truly genuine flicker of despair or hope. The way her eyes would get wide, or her lips would tremble ever so slightly. It’s really *quite* something. She really sells the internal struggle.
The film, it doesn't try to shock you or deliver big twists. It’s content to explore the everyday dramas. The kind of internal struggles that people face when they’re just trying to get through life. It’s more of a mood piece than a plot-driven thriller.
Overall, La femme du voisin is a decent watch if you’re specifically looking for a window into early French cinema. It’s *not* going to change your life, but it offers some genuinely thoughtful performances and a quiet, almost meditative pace. It’s a nice little reminder of how stories were told before sound took over everything. You just have to be in the right frame of mind for it.
IMDb 4.5
1929
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