Review of La mort de Belle

When asked to name a famous Belgian most people will look blank and after a tortuous mental effort eventually come up with Hercule Poirot! The output of Belgian-born Georges Simenon is truly prolific and his mastery of the 'psychological' thriller is unsurpassed. So as to avoid awkward questions regarding his behaviour during the Occupation, Simenon exiled himself to America in 1945 and lived for a while in Lakeville, Connecticut, where he wrote 'The End of Belle'. When it came to filming the novel in a European setting where better to transpose New England manners and morals that Geneva! Mild-mannered professor Spencer Ashby has here become Stephane Blanchon who is the prime suspect when a female student who is lodging with him and his wife is found strangled in her bedroom. As the investigation gathers pace we discover that the murdered girl was in love with him........ Although Belle appears briefly prior to her death she reappears through flashbacks and her presence permeates the film. She is played by Alexandra Stewart, surely one of the most exquisite creatures ever to have walked on to a sound stage. Every single character in this is wonderfully drawn and played to perfection by a simply superlative cast comprising many who will alas be unfamiliar to the average non-Gallic viewer. The best known face of course is that of Jean Desailly as Blanchon. A subtle and sensitive actor who was given his film break by Louis Daquin in 1943 whilst still a member of the Comedie Francaise. He reached his peak filmically with his performance as Pierre in Truffaut's 'Le peau douce'. We have the added bonus here of a screenplay by French playwright Jean Anouilh whose plays are seldom performed nowadays and some of which have been filmed with decidedly mixed results! Especially impressive are the interior monologues of Blanchon. The film is graced by yet another subtle and elegant score by Georges Delerue. This is a first class piece of film-making from director Edouard Molinaro and ripe for rediscovery. The fact that sixty years on from its release it has attracted thus far only three reviews is both mystifying and depressing. On a lighter note, Simenon once infamously claimed to have slept with 10,000 women and to be capable of writing 60-80 pages a day. If anyone deserves to be a famous Belgian then it is surely he!