Howard Vernon Movies

Le Silence de la Mer was based upon a popular wartime "underground" novel by Vercours. Most of the film is confined to the living room of a bourgeois French family. Howard Vernon plays Von Ebrennae, a cultured Nazi officer who is billeted in this household. As the residents stare at him in mute contempt, Von Ebrennae eloquently articulates his philosophy of life, which turns out to be pretty odious at times. Director Jean-Pierre Melville assembled La Silence de la Mer outside the established French film industry, using a non-union cast and crew and adapting the Vercours novel without securing the movie rights. Though it was much too verbose and cerebral for American viewers, the film proved most influential in shaping the future works of such directors as Robert Bresson and Alain Resnais. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this costume adventure set in France during the Reign of Terror, a mysterious man known only as the Scarlet Pimpernel rescues noblemen from the guillotine and leads them to safety across the English Channel. Chauvelin (Cyril Cusack) is determined to unmask the Pimpernel and bring him to justice. When evidence begins to suggest that the hero is actually foppish Sir Percey Blakeney (David Niven), Chauvelin blackmails Percey's wife, Marguerite (Margaret Leighton), into cooperating on the threat that he'll expose the criminal activities of her brother Armand (Edmund Audran). However, Marguerite doesn't much care for her husband, hardly believes he could be the heroic Pimpernel, and is startled when she finds out that he truly is the masked vigilante. The Elusive Pimpernel was originally shot in color as a musical, but the musical numbers were cut before the film was released, and the picture's American distributor chose to make only black-and-white prints (though the current home-video release is in color). ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

La Taverne de N.O. is the French title for the Franco-American costume drama Adventures of Captain Fabian. As sea captain Michael Fabian, Errol Flynn (who also adapted the screenplay from the Robert Shannon novel Fabulous Ann Madlock) is ostensibly the star. Most of the footage, however, is devoted to Micheline Presle as servant girl Lea Marriote, whose thirst for revenge against the prominent New Orleans family who wronged both her and Fabian motivates the film's plotline. After Fabian defends Lea on a murder charge, she promptly weds George Brissac (Vincent Price), scion of that aforementioned family, thereby laying the groundwork for a spectacularly unhappy finale. Filmed in Paris and Nice, La Taverne de N.O. represented the second film which Errol Flynn made in partnership with producer-director William Marshall; the first was the abortive Hello God. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The title of this French crime meller translates into The Gun Moll. Eddie Constantine makes the first of several appearances as Lemmy Caution, the two-fisted American government agent created by novelist Peter Cheney. In this outing, Lemmy is dispatched to Casablanca, there to put the kibosh on a gold-hijacking operation. His job is made easier when he wins gun moll Carlotta (Dominique Wilms) over to his side. At 105 minutes, the action flags on occasion in La Mome vert de Gris. Still, the film was successful enough to spawn a whole series of "Lemmy Caution" adventures, including Jean-Luc Goddard's novelle vague fantasy Alphaville (1966). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Sacha Guitry's Si Versailles M'Etait Conte (If Versailles Were Told to Me) is best known by its American title Royal Affairs in Versailles. In addtion to writing and directed the film, Guitry reserves for himself the plum role of Louis XIV. Concentrating on the palace of Versailles over a period of 300 years, the storyline concentrates on the various amorous and political intrigues of three French kings. The plot manages to wend its way through the French revolution, coming to a halt in "the present". The star-studded supporting cast includes Jean Marais as Louis XV, Claudette Colbert as Mme. Montespan, Micheline Presle as Mme. Pompadour, and, best of all, Orson Welles as a gouty Ben Franklin. Most currently available prints of Si Versailles M'Etait Conte are severely edited, and fail to do justice to the rich Eastmancolor hues of the original version. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Both a tribute to classic American gangster films and the source of inspiration for French New Wave filmmakers, Bob le Flambeur is the first in a series of stylish noirs that Jean-Pierre Melville started in the mid-'50s. Co-scripted by the popular crime writer Auguste Le Breton (Rififi), this is a story of ex-bank robber and compulsive gambler Bob (Roger Duchesne), who plans a heist at the Deauville casino. As in many films of that genre, he assembles a team of old friends and new acquaintances to do the job and is determined to perform it despite all the odds that continue to pile up before him. The overall tone is admirably lighthearted, however, and despite many stylistic and thematic references to American caper movies, the whole enterprise remains genuinely French. "This is a kind of film that we want to make!" exclaimed the young and rebellious François Truffaut back in 1955. Jean-Luc Godard, in his turn, acknowledged Melville's influence, giving him an extended cameo in Breathless. ~ Yuri German, Rovi

Back in Germany for the first time since 1933, director Fritz Lang returned to the screen character that brought him enormous success in his pre-Hollywood years. The Thousand Eyes of Dr. Mabuse is not so much a sequel as an extension of Lang's early Dr. Mabuse (1922) and Testament of Dr. Mabuse. Set in 1960, the film begins with a series of unsolved murders in a Berlin hotel. The modus operandi of the murderer is the same as that of long-dead megalomaniac Dr. Mabuse. Police detective Gert Frobe and amateur sleuths Peter Van Eyck and Dawn Addams suspect that the killer is a man who believes that he is the reincarnation of Mabuse. Could the culprit be secretive insurance salesman Werner Peters, or blind seer Wolfgang Preiss? The title refers to the hotel's sophisticated TV surveillance system--dozens of roving cameras and TV monitors, inspired (claimed Lang) by a sophisticated bugging method used by the Nazis during World War II. The renewed popularity of the Dr. Mabuse character spawned five movie sequels, none of which were directed by Lang, who had washed his hands of the project. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Jean-Paul Belmondo portrays Leon Morin, an altruistic priest who believes that any sin can be expunged by a good dose of faith. Emmanuelle Riva plays a wayward woman who long ago decided that the easiest way was the best. Belmondo makes it his mission to steer Riva onto the right path. Given the censorial climate of 1961, it isn't surprising that the picture was shorn of 22 minutes for its American release. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Cult director Jesus Franco had his greatest popular success with this horrific variation on George Franju's classic Les Yeux sans Visage. Set in 1912, the film concerns the efforts of mad surgeon Dr. Orloff (Howard Vernon) to reconstruct the face of his disfigured daughter Melissa (Diana Lorys). Helped by a freakish assistant named Morpho (Ricardo Valle), Orlof kidnaps several women including Dany (Maria Silva), a cabaret singer whose forgotten necklace is the clue which leads dedicated Inspector Edgar Tanner (Conrado San Martin) onto Orlof's trail. Using girlfriend Wanda Bronsky (also played by Lorys) as an undercover spy, Tanner lures Orlof into a trap, but the risks are greater than he imagines. Stock performers Perla Cristal, Mara Lasso, Venancio Muro, Felix Dafauce, and Juan Riquelme fill out the cast, while Franco himself appears as a pianist. Several versions exist, differing primarily in the amount of sex and violence depicted. One nude murder scene was later used in Pierre Chevalier's Caroline Mannequin Nue. Franco made the first of several sequels, El Secreto del Dr. Orloff in 1964. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi

The masked avenger once again rides out to stop the tyrants from oppressing the peasants of old California. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

This dark, surrealistic horror film from cult filmmaker Jesus Franco is perhaps best-remembered for its images of the lethal Miss Muerte (Estella Blain) luring victims with razor-sharp fingernails while clad in a skull-mask and a revealing bodysuit. The real star of the film is Mabel Karr, portraying Irma von Zimmer, daughter of a mad scientist whose public humiliation led to his fatal heart attack. Vowing revenge, Irma uses her father's mind-control techniques to possess Miss Muerte, a nightclub performer. The hypnotized dancer murders the doctors whom Irma blames for her father's death, slicing their throats with her poisoned nails, until police Inspector Tanner (Franco) and Miss Muerte's boyfriend (Fernando Montes) track her down. One of Franco's most entertaining films, Miss Muerte is a great improvement over the similar El Secreto del Dr. Orloff, released the previous year. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi