August 30, 2017
La Poison
Greg Vellante READ TIME: 2 MIN.
Sacha Guitry's "La Poison" is arguably the blueprint for any film you've ever seen containing a marital squabble. The film, about a married couple of 30 years who despise each other to the point where they endlessly fantasize and strongly consider one another's murders, is scathingly mean and remarkably funny, with an expert bite in its social commentary.
The fantastic Michel Simon plays a village gardener who is fed up with his nagging, drunk of a wife (Germaine Reuver), who also hates his guts. They spend their days apart-him complaining about her to anyone willing to listen (including the local priest), and her getting drunk from endless bottles of wine, cooking dinner and casually buying rat poison (just in case). At night, they eat dinner and drink across from one another while the radio plays loudly, eliminating any possibility of initiating conversation that will indubitably transform into an argument. Where the plot goes from here is where the film truly finds its thematic and comedic riches, so I wouldn't dare spoil anything else.
Writer/director Sacha Guitry uses his theatrical background to craft an eclectic and eccentric picture where performances shine at the center of it all. In a puzzling, yet unique take on the opening credits, Guitry himself actually goes around and introduces members of the cast and crew on camera, while thanking them for their contributions to the film.
Alongside a stunning high definition digital transfer, the Criterion bonus features include:
� New interview with filmmaker Olivier Assayas on writer-director Sacha Guitry's influence on French cinema
� Sixty-minute episode of Cin�astes de notre temps from 1965 featuring interviews with some of Guitry's collaborators
� On Life On-screen: Miseries and Splendour of a Monarch, a sixty-minute documentary from 2010 on the collaboration of Guitry and actor Michel Simon
� New English subtitle translation
� PLUS: An essay by film scholar Ginette Vincendeau and a tribute to Guitry by filmmaker Fran�ois Truffaut
"La poison"
Criterion Collection Blu-ray
$31.96
https://www.criterion.com/films/28637-la-poison
