Max Ophüls - Sans lendemain aka No Tomorrow (1939)

A cross between Garbo and Dietrich, French star Edwige Feuillère commands the leading role as an abandoned woman reduced to dancing in a tawdry nightclub to support her young son. When a handsome beau from her past resurfaces, she borrows money in order to put on an appearance of respectability and to recapture a bit of the lost happiness of her youth. Anticipating the fusion of melodrama and noir in Ophuls' Hollywood films, No Tomorrow also marks the last of Ophuls’ five films shot by Eugen Schüfftan, whose camera captures a similar melding of expressionism and poetic realism that he achieved in his work on Carné’s Quai des brumes.







A variation on Ophuls' film noir THE RECKLESS MOMENT (1949), NO TOMORROW is the story of a once-respectable woman who re-encounters her first love, now a successful doctor. Reduced to nude-dancing in a sleazy dive, with a son to support, Evelyne (Edwige Feuillère) borrows money at an outrageous interest rate in order to create a facade of respectability--and, it goes without saying, Georges falls in love with her all over again. But how can Evelyne maintain her bourgeois value and save son and "father" from the consequences of her fall?

Sans Lendeman was Max Ophuls' first directorial endeavor since 1938's Werther. Edwige Feuillere stars as a night club hostess with a shady past, whose sole reason for living is her adopted baby. But she is denied even this balm when ex-lover Georges Rigaud comes back into her life. Complicating matters is the presence of slimy blackmailer Georges Lannes, who intends to capitalize on Feuillere's misery. Fatalistic in the extreme, Sans Lendeman is given life by the eye-popping camera trickery of Max Ophuls, whose love affair with tracking shots reaches orgasmic dimensions.







Les circonstances de la vie amènent Evelyne, mère d'un petit garçon, à exercer le métier d'entraîneuse. Elle retrouve par hasard un ami canadien, George, devenu un homme riche et estimé. Eprise de lui, elle lui cache sa déchéance. George répond à son amour, et quand il repart au Canada, Evelyne lui confie la garde de son enfant, en promettant de les rejoindre bientôt...





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