Tuesday Review: Judex (1963)

    It’s Batman by way of the French New Wave…

    The central appeal of Batman and other such dark-themed heroes was always that he was a sinister-looking figure who was actually on the side of the angels - essentially, a good guy who looked like a bad guy. So it’s entirely fitting that his French predecessor Judex was borne out of a similar need: legendary filmmaker Luis Feuillade found great success with his film serials Fantomas and  Les Vampires, both depicting the sensational crimes of costumed villains. Wanting to fashion a more heroic character out of similar elements, Feuillade came up with Judex, a dark vigilante who prowled the streets of Paris, acting as judge, jury and sometimes executioner for criminals unlucky enough to be caught in his path. With his cape and slouch hat, he predates The Shadow by almost a decade, and Batman by even more than that. Several sequels and remakes followed, most notably Georges Franju’s Judex in 1963, a wonderfully weird and artful outing dripping with atmosphere.

    Casting the American magician Channing Pollack as the titular hero, Judex is refashioned a bit by Franju as less a divine hammer of justice and more of a fanciful magician. Which is not to sat that the character loses any bit if his menace - Pollack cuts a mean figure in the cape and hat, and every time Judex is onscreen there is an immediate air of mystery. In fact, the character is probably too mysterious - it's not hard to imagine that audiences less familiar with Judex will be somewhat in the dark, as we never really learn all that much about the titular character, other than he has an elaborate underground lair, a seemingly endless supply of masked helpers (including a pack of German shepherds!), and the ability to make doves appear out of thin air. The lone personal tidbit we gather is Judex’s borderline obsession with the lead female Jacqueline, played by Edith Scob.

    Jacqueline is the daughter of the corrupt banker Favraux, whom Judex is threatening to kill in the first scenes of the film, unless the man changes his evil ways. SPOILER - he doesn’t, and so is promptly murdered by Judex in a show-stopping scene taking place at a masked ball. Seeing an opportunity to make some money, Favraux’s scorned mistress Diana (played by the wonderful Francine Berge) and her boyfriend decide to take revenge on the family by first stealing valuable documents, and then kidnapping Jacqueline - good thing Judex is there to sort it all out.

    The plot here is a bit of an aimless mess, as various characters and story points are introduced and subsequently dropped, only to be reintroduced at the filmmakers’ convenience. It’s clear they had no real grasp of what kind of story they wanted to tell, and merely made it up as the film went along. There’s a certain unpredictable quality that’s therefore lent to the various twists and turns of the plot, but the elements are stringed together so haphazardly the film is rendered as nonsensical as a seven-year-old‘s daydreams. For instance, toward the end of the film, when Judex is captured on a building several stories up, his companion just happens to notice a circus caravan traveling down the street (in the middle of the night?), and realizes he has an old friend therein - who also happens to be a world-class acrobat. The acrobat goes on to rescue Judex and play a key role in the finale - and she’s only introduced fifteen minutes before the credits roll. Not helping the aimless and rambling plot is the film’s low-key energy. While certain scenes use this to their advantage in building appropriate levels of tension, other segments of the film drag on and on, making the 90 minute run-time feel much longer.

    But Franju and his filmmakers aren’t interested in telling a story so much as they are setting a mood - which they do with aplomb. Franju here creates the ultimate love-letter to Feuillade’s old serials, whether draping the film in extravagant set design or having Francine Berge prance around in a black catsuit much like Musidora did in Les Vampires. Several scenes are almost hypnotic in their design and execution, like the aforementioned masquerade where Judex wows the party guests with some magic while disguised in a bird mask. This is aided by a wonderfully creepy score by Maurice Jaffe, which is far too underutilized throughout the film (somewhat understandably, as Franju was copying the style of silent films as closely as he could). Franju’s artful style shines throughout, giving us a taste of what a Shadow movie directed by Fellini or Bergman might have felt like.

    Judex ultimately doesn’t make a lick of sense, but it sure is pretty to look at - and there’s nothing else out there quite like it.