User Reviews

MADAME BOVARY is something of an underrated Hollywood classic! Produced by Pandro S. Berman for MGM in 1949 it was one of the last movies of Hollywood's Golden Age! Directed with a positive flair by the ubiquitous Vincente Minnelli it was stylishly written for the screen by Robert Ardrey from the "outragious" novel by Gustav Flaubert and crisply photographed in gorgeous black & white by Robert Planck.

Jennifer Jones gives a superb performance as Emma Bovary the beautiful young vivacious woman in 19th century France who pursues her insatiable appetite for love and romance with reckless abandon resulting in her total moral decay, the neglect and alienation of her husband and young child and her eventual suicide. The actress applied herself assiduously to the role, almost eclipsing her Acadamy Award winning portrayal in "Song Of Bernadette" six years earlier. Excellent also is Van Heflin as her long suffering mild mannered doctor husband and Louis Jordan as Rudolphe - one of her lovers. Also making a striking appearance at the start of the picture is James Mason in an effective cameo as the novelist Flaubert himself who is in court on a charge of corrupting public morals with the publication of his "shameful" novel "Madame Bovary". Then from the dock Flaubert (Mason) begins to narrate the story of his infamous heroine as the film unfolds.

Underlining this heated melodrama is the wonderful music of Miklos Rozsa. This was the great composer's first score for MGM. This would be the beginning of Rozsa's most lavish and most prestigious productive period! Here at MGM he would create, among others, such outstanding works as "Quo Vadis", "Ivanhoe", "Plymouth Adventure", "All The Brothers Were Valiant", "Valley Of The Kings", "Knights Of The Round Table", "Green Fire" and culminating in 1959 with his masterpiece "Ben Hur". His score for "Madame Bovary" abounds with exquisite character themes such as those for the lovers Rudolphe (Jordan) and Leon (Christopher Kent). But his most appealing theme is reserved for the husband Dr. Bovary (Heflin) which has an engaging lyrical wistfulness to it. And the theme for the main protagonist - first heard in the Main Title - is troubled and turgid, perfectly reflecting the character of Emma Bovary. Of course the highlight and showpiece of the score is the swirling and dizzying waltz he composed for the elaborate ballroom sequence - the film's most memorable scene!

The DVD transfer is exceptional with well defined Monochrome images. But the extras aren't up to very much! There is a good trailer but there is no commentary and quite dispensable is a Droopy cartoon and a tired Pete Smith Specialty. However a movie like this that is well written, well played and beautifully shot and scored is well worth having in any collection!

It is impossible to do a perfect movie version of any novel. This is particular true about great novels. There have been huge numbers of versions of Les Miserables, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Tom Jones, David Copperfield, War and Peace...you can add the titles... and while many are really impressive as movies (or are favorites of the viewers) few of them are as good as the novel. It's because there is a serious change in the art form involved - the written word can be read and interpreted in so many ways, while the cinematic "eye" of the film may not encapsulate all the writer planned to push with his/her words.

When Gustave Flaubert wrote MADAME BOVARY in the middle of the 19th Century, he shook up that country in a way that was unusual. Flaubert wrote a story of passion and love, but from the standpoint of a female bourgeoisie in the countryside. And one who finds her escape from humdrum provincial life by her overly romantic imagination. But Emma Bovary is doomed by that imagination, and the unscrupulous reactions to it by the men who dominated that same provincial world. Her lovers, like the aristocratic Rodolphe, see her as a willing tool for their pleasure, or as a silly impediment to their careers (as her lawyer lover soon finds). As the strands of her romanticism are lopped off, as the debts she gets that her husband Charles cannot pay lead to bankruptcy, she goes to pieces and kills herself.

The full novel is wonderful, and even now I consider it possibly the best 19th Century novel. But it's appearance met with public disbelief and anger. Flaubert was put on trial for publishing an immoral book. The censors and hypocrites felt that he had besmirched the pious middle classes of the France of the 1840s and 1850s. Flaubert was acquitted, and the scandal of the trial improved the sales of the novel.

Vincent Minnelli's 1949 movie can't reach the effect of the full novel - and I say this thinking that I could only read it in English, so that I can imagine what it must be in French! He does peel the skin of the provincial society, with it's social leaders, money lenders (like Lhereux - Frank Allenby) here who are all business and no sentiment, aristocrats (Rodolphe is Louis Jourdan), and attempts to push themselves into the greater world outside. Just as Emma sees herself the object of desire by aristocrats at the ball Rodolphe throws, the village sees itself made into a household name if Charles can perform the great foot operation that will restore one of the rustics feet to normal. Both are in for great disappointment.

Minnelli sense of composition works wonders in the film. The scene where Emma finally is the center of attention looks shows her surrounded by handsome beaus in a mirror - it looks like an idea from the mid-century painter Winterhalter (although he was Austrian). The backwoods provincial background is caught perfectly. When debts starts swooping around a frightened Emma, she goes to a man she respects, and finds he's ready to make a financial arrangement if she'll sleep with him!

Minnelli surrounds the telling of the story by showing the trial of Flaubert. James Mason plays the writer, eloquently "forgiving" his heroine for flaunting the conventions of a hypocritical society. Jennifer Jones possibly had her best performance in this film - not her Oscar winner, SONG OF BERNADETTE. The climatic moment when she decides to destroy herself makes her behave like an animal - and she is a trapped animal at that point. Van Heflin plays the good-natured but boring Charles quite well.

Actually the cast was up to snuff regarding their parts, and somewhat surprising. George Zuuco, for example, is the lawyer (Dubocage) whose clerk Leon (Alf Kjelin) was Emma's second lover. He does not appear frequently but appears reading the papers of a lawsuit that Emma is trying to use to raise money on her father-in-law's prospective estate. Zucco is appalled by it, and angrily confronts Leon about this waste of time for their busy office. But a moment afterward, Zucco suddenly realizes why Leon is doing this. Actually (for a Zucco character) he softens, and says, "Do yourself a favor and forget her my boy." Not helpful for poor Emma, but actually sensible for Leon (who has a future in law).

This was something of a personal film for director Vincente Minnelli, one of my favorite directors from the 40s/50s Hollywood scene. But I can't say it's a personal favorite of mine, basically because it was too much undermined by Hollywood sensibilities. Still, it is an interesting link in the chain of Minnelli's films and reveals a lot about him as an artist. It bears interesting comparison with some of his other films, which provides my main interest in the film as opposed to what it is in and of itself.

This version of "Bovary" starts with a rather intrusive framing device wherein the author Flaubert (played by Englishman James Mason) takes the stand in defense of his novel's decency. What he ultimately provides by way of defense is rather insulting to one's intelligence -- simply the idea that art depicts "realism" of some kind and that therefore the morality of the art itself cannot be drawn into question. All of this just might have some kind of impact, if it weren't for the fact that the film itself avoids a lot of the nastier aspects of Flaubert's work and replaces them with a relatively standard misogynistic "fallen woman" tale, whitewashing the character of Charles Bovary (Van Heflin) and cleaning up the ending. So while we have James Mason eloquently defending artistic freedom, we have at the same time a compromised film that hypocritically censors Flaubert's work in order to make it more palatable to Christian sensibilities.

However, in someone other than Minnnelli's hands this script could have turned into full-on misogyny. Instead he and Jennifer Jones (in the title role) created a reasonably nuanced portrait of the woman. And what really puts it over is Minnelli's unparalleled sense of how to use the environments to enhance the characterization, from Emma's little farm room with tacked-up depictions of noble knights and ladies, to the bric-a-brac "luxury" apartment she constructs for her adult life. One of the things about Minnelli which is fascinating, and has been studied by various authors, is the way that Minnelli uses decor not just as a way of describing his characters but also as a way of actually conditioning them. Not only do the settings show the influence of the characters, and thus describe them, but they also have a direct impact on the characters. Minnelli has great sympathy with Emma Bovary's desire for escape and transcendence through fantasy, and he makes us feel it too with the great technique in the ballroom dance sequence. In all cases, Madame Bovary's surroundings dictate her behavior while she consciously believes that by purchasing all kinds of "luxury" items to surround herself with, she will thereby be able to control her own destiny through interior design.

Minnelli's film is about a woman who is afraid of the "ordinary", for whom childish romantic notions of escape become a suffocating influence on her entire life. The Charles Bovary character is played as a very down-to-earth type perhaps in order to elicit the audience's pathos but also to provide a contrast to Emma. Minnelli is conscious of the fact that film itself is often guilty of feeding these very same notions of "escape" and fantasy, and he uses this film as a way of subverting that process.

Madame Bovary (1949): Jennifer Jones, Louis Jourdan, Van Heflin, James Mason, Alf Kjellin, Gladys Cooper, John Abbott, Gene Lockhart, Harry Morgan, Frank Allenby, Ellen Corby, George Zucco, Eduard Franz, Henri Letondal, Esther Somers, Paul Cavanaugh, Frederic Tozere, Vernon Steele, John Ardizoni, Charles Bancroft, Paul Bryar, David Cavendish, Fred Cordova, George Davis, Edith Evanson, Jack George, Stuart Holmes, Karl Johnson, Gracille LaVinder, Bert LeBaron, Manuel Paris, Lon Poff, Constance Purdy, Phil Schumacher, Helen St. Rayner, Sailor Vincent....Director Vincente Minnelli, Screenplay Robert Ardrey.

French novelist Gustave Flaubert's classic masterpiece has enjoyed a long history of film adaptations. This version, from 1949 and directed by Hollywood legend Vincente Minnelli, however, takes the crown for the most faithful, most unique and interesting adaptation of the book. No, it's not perfect and it is by far the most "Hollywood" of the film versions, and it's but one of many films adapted from 19th century novels released at the end of the 1940's (Anna Karenina with Vivien Leigh and Ralph Richardson and "The Heiress" with Olivia De Havilland are others). The cinematography is grand, the sets and costumes are beautiful, perhaps too beautiful and even so, this is a supreme work of cinema and those who have read and enjoyed Madame Bovary will be sure to appreciate this film. Jennifer Jones stars as the eponymous Madame, the doomed "fallen woman" who seeks escape from her dull provincial life and marriage. Gorgeous Jennifer Jones was once an unknown actress in 30's Hollywood until her marriage to David O. Selznick rocketed her to fame. This is possibly her best performance on film, for compared to the vixenish/innocent characters she portrayed in other films, this particular performance is developed and more challenging for her. Rather than portraying Mme. Bovary as victim of fate we are forced to sympathize with, she goes all out in making her appear spoiled, self-centered and careless. Her addictions ? Living luxuriously as if she were a member of French aristocracy. But the truth is far less glamorous. She married a country doctor, Charles (Van Heflin), and was initially happy. But boredom quickly sets in. Charles is constantly away on house-calls, often in distant locales, and house-frau Emma feels trapped. Seeking to live a rich and exciting life, such as the lives of women she has read about in countless romance novels, she makes friends with prominent Parisians when she sets up a salon in her home. She goes to a ball where she meets Rodolphe Boulanger (Louis Jourdan) who becomes her lover. She gives birth to a girl, when she had wanted a boy (to live vicariously through on account of males being free and women having less rights). She neglects her home and pursues her passions with Rodolphe. Ultimately, Rodolphe has used her and tires of the affair, abandoning her after promising an elopement. Things begin to go downhill from there. She takes up another lover, her husband's friend Leon Dupuis (Alf Kjellin). Because she has furnished the home with expensive furniture, wears costly imported gowns from Paris, debts mount and soon there is no money left to pay the house with. In despair, she drinks arsenic and dies. This is not a pretty story. The addition of Gustav Flaubert's court trial (his book was banned in France) is a superb touch. Flaubert (James Mason) defends himself by stating that Mme. Bovary is a figure straight out of reality and that he was only mirroring reality. Madame Bovary's drowns in her own excesses. Paris, too, could die the same way. Minnelli's film is a winner in many respects. The music by Miklos Rozsa is both touching and dramatic. The cinematography by Robert Planck has the feel of old Hollywood costume epic. The costumes are from veteran Hollywood costume designer Walter Plunkett (of Gone With The Wind). The best touches are found within the film's structure. For instance, at the ball, Emma becomes the center of attention and guests go as far as to break windows when she gasps for air after a dizzying waltz. Louis Jourdan as Rodolphe is perfectly cast, and here he is at the beginning of his long career in film. He may not be doing anything particularly good, but he fits the character's shallowness and selfishness (like Madame Bovary's) quite well. Van Helfin as the long-suffering, betrayed husband is terrific. This film, unfortunately, is one that time has forgot and what a shame. There's so many reasons to preserve it: Vincente Minelli (who would marry Judy Garland and father Liza Minnelli) felt this was one of his early masterpieces and would later go on to make other hit films like "Gigi" (working again with Jourdan). If you must watch one Mme. Bovary film, make it this one. It's also highly recommended for viewing in college English classes reading the book.

Carl Jung, the Swiss psychologist, posited four types of personalities: the sensation type, the feeling type, the thinking type, and the intuitive type. Now, your typical sensation type (lecturer points to portrait of Madame Bovary) lives for the moment, switches allegiances on impulse, luxuriates in the indulgence of her sensory apparatus, cannot be depended upon, and is insensitive to the feelings of others except as they affect her. We may forgive a sensation type, but are we really supposed to like her? Says who? That's kind of how I felt about this story. I'd heard as a youngster that this was supposed to be a sexy novel. It was known as "Madame Ovary." So I struggled through it but it seemed boring. Maybe in French there were grace notes in the prose, absent from the English translation. But I really don't know how anything could have saved this from being a weeper.

The viewer gets the general idea quickly enough because the narrator, James Mason, gives it to us right off the bat. The young, poor Emma Bovary (Jennifer Jones)is suffering an acute case of "Bovarism." She lives in a world of romantic fantasy, a kind of Ruritania of the mind, with dashing knights and love in Swiss chalets. Her walls are plastered with illustrations from fairy tales. And she never outgrows this world of make-believe.

She doesn't have enough insight to know that marrying the devoted but dull village doctor (Van Heflin, in a good, bumbling performance)is not the answer. She attributes her dissatisfaction to her need for a child, a boy. She eventually has her child, but it's a girl and the girl rejects her in favor of her husband and her housekeeper.

And who wouldn't reject Emma? Half the time she's hysterical, and the other half she's about to become hysterical. Anyway, the next thing you know, Emma has taken up with the local clerk and, when he's booted over to Rouen by his domineering mother, she takes up with the handsome, dashing, narcissistic, rich Rodolphe Boulanger (Louis Jordan). She decorates poor Doctor Bovary's house in expensive fabrics and furniture, borrowing secretly from a stone-faced usurer who will in the end bring her and her family down by selling the notes, which means bankruptcy for the Bovarys. She throws herself at the feet of an erstwhile lover and begs for money. "I haven't got it," he says, and throws her out. In an excess of self-pity (I didn't notice much in the way of guilt) she eats some arsenic and is called away to answer to a higher collection agency.

The movie has one or two neat set pieces, directed by Vincent Minelli. There's the scene at the first ball to which the Bovarys are invited, the ball at which Emma first dances with Rodolphe and the awkward, anxious husband gets drunk. I'm not much for balls. Everybody gets dressed up and dances in circles. "I don't know how to waltz," Emma tells Rodolphe. Well, Emma, neither does anyone else now. In a college class I was trying to get across the notion of dialectics and asked for a volunteer from the audience to help me demonstrate the waltz step. No volunteers because nobody knew how to waltz -- or what a waltz was, for that matter.

Minelli sets up this ball, though, so that it's not nearly as boring as most. The guys are boozing it up, the women look gorgeous in their elaborate Walter Plunkett gowns, and when one of the ladies feels dizzy from dancing, the host orders attendants to bash out the windows. There is also a wild wedding scene that might have come from Pieter Bruegel or maybe Sam Pekinpah's "Ride the High Country."

Jennifer Jones is Emma with a breathless lisp. Van Heflin is nearly perfect as the humble, inarticulate doctor. (Doctors in the 1850s weren't as high in the status-sphere as they are today. If they had been, Emma would have been not only foolish to betray her husband but downright loco.) This role must have stereotyped Louis Jordan because he seemed to play little but the same pavonine French lover in film after film.

However, although I may not have gotten very much out of it, others might. I haven't looked at the user's ratings but I'd be mildly surprised if women didn't give it a higher score than men. Sensation types of either gender are likely to switch channels before it's over.

I am surprised and a little disappointed that this film is overlooked when discussing the best films of director Vincente Minnelli. Even he seemed to disregard it--he gave it very little time in any interview he gave. Yet when watching "Madame Bovary", the film is stunningly, and it seems, lovingly, directed by Metro's master. Every scene is beautifully crafted, and the highlight of course is the ballroom sequence, which seems to be the only part of the film ever thought highly of. All the way through the camera movement, design, pacing, the understanding of the complexities of Emma Bovary's situation are perfect. Even without the performances of the cast all this would make it very, very admirable. Add to that Jennifer Jones' excellent performance in the tile role, alternately child-like and passionate, giddy and neurotic, and you have a great film. Jourdan is also fine as Emma's dream lover, and the criticisms of Heflin's performance as stiff and boring are unjust. He is very subtle, and plays it well. I never thought I would say this, because I'm crazy about the guy, but Mason's intro and concluding trial scenes as author Gustave Flaubert just don't gel with the rest of the film. Mason gives his usual intelligence and consideration to the role, but somehow his voice-over doesn't work? I still liked the Flaubert scenes though, incorporating the author. Minnelli's film stands tall to Flaubert's novel, and it's a wonderful adaptation.