Story of movie Les Mis%c3%a9rables 1958 Film :
Les Misérables is a 1958 French-East German-Italian film adaptation of the Victor Hugo novel released in France on 12 March 1958. Written by Michel Audiard and René Barjavel, the film was directed by Jean-Paul Le Chanois. It stars Jean Gabin as Jean Valjean.
| Les Misérables | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Jean-Paul Le Chanois |
| Screenplay by | Michel Audiard René Barjavel |
| Based on | Les Misérables by Victor Hugo |
| Starring | Jean Gabin |
| Music by | Georges Van Parys |
| Cinematography | Jacques Natteau |
| Edited by | Lieselotte Johl Emma Le Chanois |
Production company | Deutsche Film (DEFA) |
| Distributed by | Pathé (France) VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb (East Germany) Continental Distributing (US) |
Release date |
|
Running time | 217 minutes |
| Country | France East Germany Italy |
| Language | French |
| Box office | 9,968,993 admissions (France) |
Screenplay
The bishop's background is briefly sketched rather than detailed as in the novel. Javert is a young boy, the son of a guard in the Toulon prison, when he sees Valjean as a convict. Javert comes to arrest Jean Valjean when he is in the house of Thénardiers intending to take Cosette with him. Sister Simplice admits Valjean and Cosette to the convent instead of Father Fauchevent. Thénardier, in disguise, meets Marius and proves to him with the help of newspaper clippings that he is completely mistaken about Valjean's criminal past.
- Jean Gabin as Jean Valjean/Champmathieu
- Bernard Blier as Javert (father and son)
- Danièle Delorme as Fantine
- Bourvil as Thénardier
- Elfriede Florin as La Thénardier
- Giani Esposito as Marius Pontmercy
- Béatrice Altariba as Cosette
- Martine Havet as young Cosette
- Silvia Monfort as Éponine
- Mireille Daix as young Éponine
- Jimmy Urbain as Gavroche
- Serge Reggiani as Enjolras
- Fernand Ledoux as Monseigneur Myriel
- Isabelle Lobbé as Azelma
- Jean d'Yd as Mabeuf
- Jean Murat as Colonel Georges Pontmercy
- Lucien Baroux as Monsieur Gillenormand
- Suzanne Nivette as Mademoiselle Gillenormand
- Jacques Harden as Courfeyrac
- Marc Eyraud as Grantaire
- Werner Dissel as Brevet
- Beyert as Bahorel
- Hans-Ulrich Laufer as Combeferre
- Gérard Darrieu as Feuilly
- Pierre Tabard as Prouvaire
- Henri Guégan as Laigle
- Julienne Paroli as Madame Magloire
- Laure Paillette as Toussaint
- Madeleine Barbulée as Soeur Simplice
- Christian Fourcade as Petit Gervais
- Bernard Musson as Bamatabois
- René Fleur as The cardinal
- Ardisson as A gendarme
- Jean Ozenne as The prefect of Montreuil
- Bernard Musson as A bourgeois
- Gerhard Bienert as The president of the court
- Harry Hindemith as Un bagnard
Called "the most memorable film version", it was filmed in East Germany and was overtly political. Of the many film adaptations of the novel, this has been called "the one most popular with audiences in postwar France". One noteworthy plot change was made to accommodate the fact that the actors playing the roles of Valjean and Javert were far apart in age, rather than near contemporaries as in the novel. Instead of Javert recognizing Valjean as a convict he had often guarded years earlier, he remembers how, when he was just a boy, his prison guard father had pointed out this man as "the worst kind of prisoner, who tried to escape four times".
The movie was a massive hit in France, the second most popular of 1958.
The New York Times described it as one of the first French "blockbusters" that appeared in response to such lengthy feature films as Around the World in 80 Days and The Ten Commandments. It said it was "a ponderous four-hour retelling of Victor Hugo's oft-filmed epic.... Not a page is skipped... Too literary, it has the saving grace of Jean Gabin's truly heroic depiction of Jean Valjean plus some stirring scenes on the barricades." It was a "quintessential Gabin role ... that of a loner, an outsider, usually a member of the lower orders who may flirt with love and happiness but knows they are not for him".
The film did not premiere in New York until July 1989, when it ran to coincide with the celebration of the bicentennial of the French Revolution.
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