Film Forum

France, Italy, 1952
Directed by René Clair
Written by René Clair, Pierre Barillet, Jean-Pierre Grédy
With Gérard Philipe, Martine Carol, Gina Lollobrigida, Magali Vendeuil
Approx. 87 min. Restored DCP. 

“Clair's engaging fantasy stars Philipe as a frustrated young composer who escapes from poverty, noise, and failure into dreams of la belle époque, where his music is the talk of the Paris Opéra, and a lovely married woman (Carol, in reality mother of one of his pupils) melts in his arms. But old men lamenting, first that the real belle époque was 1830, then 1789, drive his dreams back in time to military conquest and an exotic princess (Lollobrigida, in reality the cashier in the local café), then to revolutionary fervour and the love of a pretty aristocrat (Vendeuil, in reality the girl next door).” – Time Out

Restored DCP courtesy Gamount.