Quai Des Brumes – Filmin and Film Culture

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Filmin is a Spanish video streaming site that offers old films, documentaries and television series. It provides an alternative to Netflix, Amazon Prime and other video streaming services that provide mainly mainstream films and television series.

For a while I was watching Northern Exposure, a series that has not been broadcast for a while on English language platforms. it's an interesting series that is still relevant today.

I also watched Nanook of the North and I found this to be a pleasant documentary. It's observational, observing the inuit people as they go through an "ordinary day". It was criticised because of how the igloo scenes and others were setup, but I still think it has value, despite this. They didn't have the technology that we have today, to shoot in low light conditions.

Quai Des Brumes

Quai Des Brumes is a film that I read about several times when I was studying the history of Cinéma, so I wanted to see it. It was shot in 1939, in Le Havre, when the weather was foggy.

Historical Scenes

I could re-read film theory books, to rehash what film historians write about it but I think it's more interesting to look at other aspects. One of them is the truck scene at the beginning. The offer and smoking of cigarettes without filters, and then the swerve to avoid the dug, precipitated by Jean, rather than the driver.

We also see a lot of smoke. We see smoke from buildings, we see smoke from steam ships. We see steam ships with two to three smoke stacks. We also see the unloading of ships before containerisation. We see them use ropes, cranes, but also people transporting sacks onto the ships.

This film, as much as being film history, is also a documentary of another age. 1939 France.

The Panama Scene

The Panama scene reminds us of life before mobile phones and television. We see people talk with each other, walking around and that ship that was mounted in a bottle. We see the water tank with a tap, where gravity feeds the water through so that you can rinse your hands under the flowing water, before running water.

The Old Style Car

If, like me, you read La Bande a Picsou and other comics then you are familiar with the old style of car, the style where two people sit at the front, and a third person can sit at the back, if you flip the boot open. Until this film I thought these cars were from comic books, not real life.

The Bar Scene

"How much does a bedroom cost?"

"18 Francs"

"Can I have a small glass?, no not in a small glass, give me a big glass"

And a little later

"Can I have a bedroom"

"It's early, don't you want to wait?"

"Yes"

"Do you want a drink?"

"No I want to sleep"

This film is written by Jacques Prévert, a poet, and it shows in scenes like the one above.

Poetic realism films are "recreated realism", stylised and studio-bound, rather than approaching the "socio-realism of the documentary".

The Beauty of Old Films

What makes watching old films so interesting is that each one is different. Writers explore topics, and tell stories in unique and original ways, that keep you interested. When you watch old films you stop staring at your phone or laptop and get transported into the film.

In contrast a lot of American films are formulaic, to such a degree that after 15 minutes you know the entire storyline. Such films are uninteresting to watch, which is why we play with phones and other distractions.

Film as Art Rather Than Amateurism

One of the greatest frustrations of modern video content creation is that for a big proportion of content, it is produced by people that did not study classical film, that did not study montage, that did not study the history of film and television, so their story telling is less interesting, and their editing less artful.

Andrew Keen wrote of the Cult of Amateur, and YouTube and Instagram have become the temples of the amateur. Old films can be boring, but every shot was considered, framed and contextualised. Film and television should remain as an art form, rather than what it has become today.

I love the idea of YouTube, but I hate that it settles for the lowest common denominator, for tabloid sensationalism, rather than content with value.

And Finally

We have over a century of films to choose from, and yet streaming sites like Netflix, Amazon Prime and others only show the newest crap, rather than the interesting vintage films. It's good to have new content, but I think that streaming services should cater to every age group, not just the young. Cinema is rich and diverse, and streaming services should grab the opportunity provided by old films.