381. The Rules Of The Game (1939)

Starring: Marcel Dalio, Nora Gregor, Paulette Dubost

Director: Jean Renoir

Running Time: 110 mins

The Rules Of The Game (La Règle Du Jeu) is a French film about the lives of upper class Frenchmen just before the start of World War Two, and the relationships between themselves, as well as the unknown ones amongst their poorer servants.

Ok, this film may be a classic, but the problem is, it’s not timeless. I can definitely appreciate that it would have been fantastically funny and relevant to France in 1939, and it was a seemingly very modern idea to bring this comedic film into a world where peace was disappearing and total war was coming along.

However, to be watched nowadays, by any person who wants to watch a film that is good because of its own content, this isn’t ideal. It was hard to really connect with the story, as I’ve got no idea what that society was like, and the fact that it was now around 7 decades ago means that it was really difficult for me to find any way to decipher or translate (not literally, I had subtitles) what was going on into something that I could really understand.

Also, I didn’t get the comedy very much. This was inevitable, due to the fact that I am so out of touch with that era, as are many people nowadays. However, it wasn’t just the fact that it was so dated that led me to not enjoy this film as much as I would have liked to, it was also more of a commentary on society than a comedy about society, meaning the story was a lot flimsier and therefore less interesting to me.

Overall, I’ll give this a 6.1, which may seem low for such an acclaimed film, however it is now very dated, and so very difficult for many people to try and understand and enjoy.