Une Nuit au Paradis (1932) Review - Loud, messy, and surprisingly fun

You should probably only watch Une nuit au paradis if you have a deep, almost unhealthy love for early 1930s French bedroom farces. Anyone expecting a normal, sensible plot or clean sound quality will absolutely hate this within five minutes. 😅

It is basically seventy minutes of people running in and out of hotel rooms, yelling at the top of their lungs. The whole thing revolves around a massive misunderstanding, a fake marriage, and some very noisy jewelry.

Anny Ondra is the main reason to even bother with this. She has this incredibly strange, hyperactive energy that makes her feel like she wandered in from a silent cartoon.

Her French is... let's call it adventurous. But she is so charming you sort of don't care that you can't understand half of her lines.

It reminded me a bit of her role in Der Weg zur Schande, though she is much more frantic here. She just bounces off the walls, and honestly, who can blame her?

There is this one scene where Robert Pizani tries to hide behind a ridiculously small curtain. You can see his entire left leg and half his torso just sticking out.

The camera just sits there, staring at him for what feels like a solid minute. It is so dumb, but I actually laughed out loud. 🤷‍♂️

The Clunky Charm of Early Sound

The audio is pretty rough, which is typical for 1932, I guess. Every time someone closes a door, it sounds like a gunshot.

Also, the background music just completely disappears for long stretches, leaving these incredibly awkward silences. You can practically hear the actors waiting for their cues.

The set design is another thing. The hotel lobby looks like it was built in about three hours using leftover cardboard and some shiny paint.

Every time someone walks across the floor, the whole room seems to shake slightly.

Here are a few highly specific things I wrote down while watching:

• The extra in the background of the lobby scene who is holding a newspaper upside down for a solid three minutes.
• The way Robert Pizani says "Ah!" every time he enters a room, like he is surprised he found the door.
• A small dog that appears for exactly one shot, looks directly at the camera with pure terror, and is never seen again.

The writers (and there are six of them credited, which is insane for a movie this simple) clearly just kept throwing gags at the wall. Most of them do not stick, but the ones that do are delightfully goofy.

It is definitely better than some other dry comedies from this era, like It Isn't Being Done This Season, which just felt endless. Une nuit au paradis at least has the decency to keep moving, even if it is just running in circles.

Marcel Carpentier has some funny moments as the outraged authority figure, though he sweats a lot under the hot studio lights. Like, his forehead is literally glistening in every single close-up.

Do not expect a masterpiece. But if you want some loud, silly, black-and-white escapism, it does the trick.