Stagey, barely convincing, and riddled with poor filmmaking/acting.

This is a charming film about love and sacrifice, populated with loveable characters and amusing situations. There is an easygoing air to these old French movies... even the arguments and conflicts have an affectionate tone. The father-son relationship between Marius and Cesar (a winning performance by Raimu) has an adorable sweetness to it, as when they each humor the other's deceptions. Demazis' portrayal of Fanny is a little harder to pin down, but such is the nature of an adolescent girl.

I didn't feel the magic as much in this classic. Maybe it's a film thats get stronger by each viewing, but on first view it dragged on a bit with too much talking seemingly going nowhere fast. For sure interesting characters and the story was there, but didn't think they got as much out of the moments as one could have hoped. However the ending was fairly strong and lifted up the impression.