The Rules of the Game | La Règle du jeu (1939)

Synopsis

Tragedy and comedy effortlessly combine in Renoir's country house ensemble drama.

A group of aristocrats gather for some rural relaxation, a shooting party is arranged, downstairs the servants bicker about a new employee, while all the time husbands, wives, mistresses and lovers sweetly deceive one another and swap declarations of love like name cards at a dinner party. -- Sight and Sound

Widely regarded as one of the greatest films ever made, Jean Renoir’s masterpiece The Rules of the Game is a scathing critique of corrupt French society cloaked in a comedy of manners.



At a weekend hunting party, amorous escapades abound among the aristocratic guests and are mirrored by the activities of the servants downstairs.

The refusal of one of the guests to play by society’s rules sets off a chain of events that ends in tragedy. Poorly received upon its release in 1939, the film was severely re-edited, and the original negative was destroyed during World War II.

Only in 1959 was the film fully reconstructed and embraced by audiences and critics who now see it as a timeless representation of a vanishing way of life. -- Mubi

Cast: Nora Gregor, Paulette Dubost, Mila Parély, Odette Talazac, Jean Renoir, Marcel Dalio, Roland Toutain, Gaston Modot, Pierre Magnier, Pierre Nay, Richard Francœur, Claire Gérard, Anne Mayen, Julien Carette, Eddy Debray, Léon Larive, Lise Élina, Henri Cartier-Bresson

Read about this film

Country: France
Language: French
Color: Black and White
Runtime: 110 min.