This week, we've been celebrating Simone Signoret's centennial, an unlikely sex-symbol of the midcentury and an even more atypical Oscar champion. Previously, Daniel wrote about the French actress' brief appearance in La Ronde, and Eric paid tribute to what's probably her most excellent vehicle, Casque d'Or. Now that it's my turn to wax poetic about Madame Signoret, I find myself in a bit of a conundrum. You see, even before the centennial celebrations, the actress had been on my mind. Though, it wasn't because of a film she starred in or individual performance. Watching the animated film No. 7 Cherry Lane, I can't help but think that no one will ever be able to create a more beautiful homage to this star than director Yonfan…
ROOM AT THE TOP (1959) and NO. 7 CHERRY LANE (2019)
No. 7 Cherry Lane, which premiered in the Venice Film festival Main Competition of 2019 and was eligible this season in Animated Feature, is a work of animated cinema for an adult audience. It's an intoxicating poem about the passage of time and nostalgia, about getting old, feeling the prick of desire, lust for the flesh, and the projected image. Set in the Hong Kong of the 1960s, the story revolves around a handsome college student who becomes romantically involved with a young woman he tutors and her mother. The plot may sound like cheap pornography, but the result is both more complex and more sensual than that. For one, as much as the male figure is our entry point into the story, it's his older lover that ends up defining the perspective of the later acts.
Through her eyes, her imagination, we experience hypnotic fantasies, sorrowful meditations, as well as the cruel and wondrous magic that is to see oneself reflected on the silver screen. Many of No. 7 Cherry Lane's best passages focus on Simone Signoret's movies, specifically the ones that found the actress playing romantic partner to younger men. These flicks are some of her most famous titles while also feeling like an anachronistic artifact within the context of mid-century cinema. In her films, Signoret got to romance and share the screen with the likes of Yves Montand (her real-life husband), Alain Delon, Laurence Harvey, Oskar Werner, Jean-Louis Trintignant, and many more.
In solipsistic narration and many animated facsimiles of the great Signoret, Yonfan explores her particular allure, the cloud of melancholy which followed her in perpetuity, the odd mix of tragedy and eroticism she brought to her most famous films. Room at the Top, Famous Love Affairs, and Ship of Fools are heavily featured, but the cineaste's considerations apply to most Signoret movies. Hers was a face made for the camera, an angular monument crowned by a gold crown of silky hair, bejeweled by eyes which always looked despondent. She could be burning with fury or euphoric with glee, but Signoret's eyes always held a promise of tragedy.
SHIP OF FOOLS (1965)
The key to her magnetism, her sensuality, may be found in that promise. Love in Signoret's films never comes off as a permanent state of happiness, nor does it shine with the glint of simple joy. Every smile feels earned with pain, and each seduction carries with it the weight of a troubled past, a weary future. Like the pleasure of an orgasm, one feels that the cinematic loves of Signoret are temporary, as ephemerous as the passing seasons, and just as magnificent. While never overplaying her parts, Signoret drew the eye, captured the attention through this unspoken assurance that her world is one of passing delights, of fatalism and the sort of passion that leave one too exhausted to live.
None of this is meant to suggest Signoret was all star presence and no acting skill. Even as Yonfan evokes the measured gesture and mournful looks of his beloved star, the animation is incapable of capturing the subtlety of the actress' craft. Perusing her filmography, one finds a sprawling wealth of exquisite performances which require that the spectator pay attention, come closer. She never made a spectacle out of her roles, preferring to use little details, nuanced tonalities, to construct characterizations. I'm thinking of her measured expression in Diabolique, the stoic shame of The Witches of Salem, the averted gazes and nervous half-smiles that earned her an Oscar for Room at the Top, the bruised feeling she projects in Ship of Fools, the steely resolve of Army of Shadows, the vicious line readings of The Cat, Madame Rosa's faraway stares.
MADAME ROSA (1977)
Simone Signoret was both a star and a great actress, an icon too. Nearly 35 years after her passing, this titan of French cinema still inspires great artists like Yonfan, her legacy forever influencing those who care to watch her brilliant films and gaze at the marvel that was her screen presence. In life, she won an Oscar, an Emmy, three BAFTAs, prizes from Berlin and Cannes, a César, and some other golden accolades. In death, she has won cultural immortality, her filmography making her into a movie goddess like few others. As we celebrate her centennial, there's no better way to honor Signoret than watching her work, discussing her mastery, speaking our love for her. Are you as besotted with Simone Signoret as Yonfan, the characters of No. 7 Cherry Lane, and I?
Some of Signoret's best movies are available to stream. You can find La Ronde, Casque d'Or, and Diabolique on the Criterion Channel. In Kanopy, you can also find Room at the Top, Is Paris Burning?, Adua and Her Friends, and Death in the Garden.