Cinema Hype

All right, I’ll admit it. If the monthlong gap between Project 501 posts hasn’t been enough of a tip-off, you should know: I’ve been putting off The Life of Emile Zola. In the long parade of Best Picture winners, French writers’ biopics are like the local-business floats: you know they’re coming, but you’re not really all that excited about them. Luckily for me—and I really should learn this lesson someday—Zola easily surpassed my expectations. This is no insurance company banner. We’re talking high-school drill team, at least.

The most striking thing about Zola is how relevant it is, even—or especially—today; it’s full of dialogue that could easily come straight from current American news footage. Public discourse on the acceptability of torture? Deep animosity between a shady government and an inconveniently nosy press corps? A military bent on denying responsibility, headed by a leader blinded by his own personal authority? Any of this sounding familiar?

As a biopic, Zola isn’t all that complete or all that effective: aside from his ascent from starving writer to national voice and his touching friendship with his artsy roommate, some guy called Paul Cezanne, director William Dieterle glosses over Zola’s personal life. As a courtroom drama, however, it’s pretty fantastic: the retelling of the Dreyfus affair, in which Zola purposefully had himself arrested and tried in order to clear the name of a Jewish soldier wrongly exiled, is far more interesting than anything going on in the Zola household. The coverage of Zola’s trial is long and loving, complete with plenty of corrupt and politicized judicial action, some truly hilarious judges’ uniforms, and an appropriately satisfying final speech by Zola (Paul Muni) himself. The crowd in the courtroom is rowdy, hooting and hollering and crying out when anything happens, but they’re a great representative of the real-life audience: this is dramatic and emotional, the kind of thing that deserves the attention and the buy-in of the people. Even considering the few cheesy touches Dieterie works in (personal favorite: the camera panning from Zola’s face to an enormous painting of the crucifixion of Jesus), the movie is enough of an emotional force that it works.

Good on you, 1937 Academy voters.

Next up: You Can’t Take it With You (1938)! For more on Project 501, click here; to read past Project 501 posts, click here.

The Life of Emile Zola, Project 501, Best Picture winners, Oscar winners, You Can’t Take It With You