La femme rêvée (1929) is a strange, dusty little silent drama

Is it worth your time?

If you have a soft spot for late silent films that feel like they are trying really hard to be poetic, then yes. It is definitely for people who enjoy the slow, heavy atmosphere of 1920s melodrama.

If you hate movies where people stare at each other for three minutes without saying a word, stay away. You will probably find it incredibly boring.

The story starts in Seville. Angel Call—which is a bit of a weird name for a businessman, right?—crashes his car. He almost goes blind, which is a pretty dramatic way to start a Tuesday.

Then we meet Mercédès. She’s played by Alice Roberts. She’s supposed to be a nun, or becoming one soon, but she ends up nursing Angel back to health instead.

• The lighting in the recovery scenes is actually pretty nice.
• There is a lot of dabbing of eyes with wet cloths.
• Alice Roberts has a very calm face that makes the whole 'convent' thing believable.
• The car crash looked... well, it looked like a 1929 car crash. A bit clunky.

Once Angel can see again, he falls for her. Of course he does. She saved his eyes. It’s that classic trope where the first thing the guy sees is the woman of his dreams. La femme rêvée, literally.

They head off to Paris. This is where the movie gets a bit more interesting, or at least more crowded. Paris in these old movies is always portrayed as this place that just eats innocent people alive.

Mercédès starts seeing the 'temptations.' There are parties. There is dancing. It’s a big shift from the quiet, dusty rooms of Seville.

I have to mention Vicente Escudero. He’s a dancer in this, and honestly, he’s the best part. His movement is so sharp compared to the sort of floaty acting everyone else is doing.

"The way he moves makes the rest of the cast look like they're standing in invisible mud."

There is also Charles Vanel. He’s one of those actors who just has a great face. He looks like he’s always about to tell you some bad news, but he’s holding it back to be polite.

It reminds me a little bit of Orochi in how it focuses on a single person's struggle against what society expects of them, though obviously the setting is totally different. This is much less about swords and much more about longing glances.

Small things I noticed

There’s a scene in a club where the smoke is so thick I think the camera operator was probably coughing. It makes everything look blurry and dreamlike, which I guess fits the title.

One of the side characters has a mustache that is so perfectly curled it’s distracting. I spent about five minutes wondering how they kept it like that during the outdoor scenes.

The transition between the quiet life and the Paris life feels a bit sudden. Like, one minute she’s praying and the next she’s looking at fancy dresses like she’s never seen fabric before.

It’s not as fast-paced as something like Robin Hood. It lingers. Sometimes it lingers too much on things that don't really matter, like a vase or a door frame.

The writing by Jean Durand and J. Perez de Rozas is pretty standard for the time. It doesn't take many risks. It’s a story about a 'pure' girl being tested by the big city. We've seen it a million times.

But there’s something about the way it’s shot that feels personal. It doesn't feel like a factory-made movie. It feels like someone really cared about how the light hit Alice Roberts’ hair in that one specific garden scene.

I also thought about Motherhood while watching this. Both movies have this heavy focus on what a woman's 'duty' is supposed to be. It’s all very 1920s.

Final thoughts while drinking coffee

The ending felt a little rushed to me. It’s like they had this big build-up and then just decided to wrap it up in five minutes. I hate when movies do that, even old ones.

Harry Pilcer as Angel is okay, but he’s a bit stiff. He acts with his eyebrows a lot. A lot.

Is it better than The Goofy Age? Yeah. It’s got more soul than that. It’s not trying to be funny, which helps.

If you find a copy of this, maybe watch it on a rainy Sunday. It fits that mood. Just don't expect a masterpiece of storytelling. It's more of a visual diary of a guy who got lucky after a car wreck.

The Seville parts are much better than the Paris parts. The sun felt real there. Paris felt like a set. A very nice set, but still a set. 🎞️

Anyway, it's a decent watch if you like looking at old faces and fancy 1920s clothes. Just keep your expectations in check.