FREEDOM FOR US (1931)

A.K.A.: A Nous la Liberte

Country: France

Genre(s): Comedy / Musical

Director: Rene Clair

Cast: Raymond Cordy / Henri Marchand / Rolla France

Plot

Two prison cellmates, Emile and Louis, attempt an escape, but only Emile makes his way out.  Emile hides his past and, over the next several years, becomes a wealthy industrialist. Once Louis finally gets out, the pair are reunited and Emile must find a way to help his destitute friend without revealing his own true identity.

What I Liked

Few comedies that I am aware of have dared display as much political and social satire so blatantly as does “Freedom For Us.”  With an obviously Leftist bent, director Rene Clair manages to parody or lampoon pretty much the entirety of capitalist society in ways that can still have meaning for a twenty-first century viewer.  Many hot button topics of today, such as a for-profit prison system or the detachment of politicians from the problems of everyday people, have analogs within this film made more than eighty years ago.

Made at the dawn of the sound era, “Freedom For Us” also has an distinctive feel that originated from director Clair’s experimenting with what audiences wanted from – and what was possible in - “talkies.”  For example, where today natural sounds would be used in a film for things like the blowing of wind or the buzzing of a factory assembly line, Clair chose to use sound effects created from musical instruments as part of Georges Auric’s almost constant musical score.

Speaking of the music, there is so much of it in this film that one could conceivably label it a musical.  Typically, the musical isn’t my favorite film genre, but this one gets bonus points for Clair and Auric’s choice to use the music to add the satire.  For example, in the very opening scene, we’re treated to images of flowers and, in the background the voices of men singing about the virtues and pleasures of liberty.  It’s only when the camera pulls back that we realize that we’re watching those same men assemble fake flowers in a prison workshop.  They all wear the same convict’s uniform and sing their song as armed guards patrol around them.  Musical made ironic social commentary.

What I Didn’t Like

For the most part, the physical comedy of the movie falls flat today, which is a shame since it makes up most of the film’s plot and because in truth the film was far ahead of its time and highly influential for its heavily choreographed physical comedy sequences.  Members of the crew would later go on to sue Charlie Chaplin for cribbing from this film for his film “The Great Dictator.”  Fans of “I Love Lucy” and the “Benny Hill Show” will also recognize familiar elements of those shows in some of the movie’s moments.  The problem is, most of us have already gotten our belly laughs for these scenes from the latter rip-off versions, and thus “Freedom For Us” – the originator of so much of that comedy – seems like the tired, derivative knock off.  Factual or not, that’s how it feels and thus I never did let out an actual laugh through the entire course of the hour-and-a-half film.  To the film’s credit though, it remains entertaining and interesting throughout, even without the laughs.

Most Memorable Scene

One of the most obvious moments of social criticism from the film comes when the long-suffering Louis finally makes it out of the meaningless work, conformity, and oppression of the prison to fall right into the meaningless work, conformity, and oppression of the capitalist factory in the same very day.  It was a powerful, risky statement to make in an era before big corporations got their hands on the film industry and made an effort to shut out any controversy in an attempt to make products more palatable for the public.

The scene also works because it’s one of the genuinely funniest moments from the film as Louis, with the most simplistic training possible, is given a seat on an assembly line where he is expected to put a single piece into each phonograph that passes by.  When a supervisor distracts him and a phonograph gets by him, we are able to witness the birth of a classic comedy scenario that will be familiar to fans of both Charlie Chaplin and Lucile Ball.

My Rating: 4 out of 5