or Port of Shadows
starring Jean Gabin, Michel Simon, Michèle Morgan, Pierre Brasseur
directed by Marcel Carné
in French with English subtitles
Jean (Jean Gabin), a deserter, arrives in Le Havre looking for transport away from France. He meets Nelly (Michèle Morgan) at a small run down establishment. Jean gets on the bad side of Lucien, a local wannabe tough guy, when he stands up for Nelly when Lucien tries forcing himself on her.
Jean and Nelly's budding romance encounters another roadblock in the form of Zabel (Michel Simon), her lecherous godfather. Jean books passage for himself on a ship headed to Venezuela but before the ship leaves the body of Maurice, Nelly's ex-boyfriend surfaces in the harbor. Jean immediately becomes a suspect.
Man on the run, loses track of what he's trying to do, falls in love, and suffers the consequences.
I think I missed out on some of the dialogue (in the early going) because I was focusing more on the spoken words than I was on the subtitles. I missed a key point or two that way and didn't realize it until much later. I missed enough that my description of the plot isn't completely accurate but I'm going to leave it as is.
There's more than one thing about this movie that reminds me of Casablanca (1942).
This movie feels very noir.
All of the performances in this movie were good to great.
The ending to the movie really got me. I really need to watch this again at some point.
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