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for the mysteriously glowing experience. Indeed, with com-
peak, but their elders r estrain position 'and filters, Schneeberger
them. Early next morning, produces effects that make the
Junta again approaches the vil- settings so superlatively beauti-
lage from h er mountain hut, ful :>.s to enha nce quite wonder-
and is set upon a s a witch. fully the out-of-this-world flav-
Incensed by all this, Vigo defends our of the theme. Therein lies
her and she escapes over the the film's greate~ attraction, but
bridge to the mounta ins and also its other main weakness.
safety, encountering Guzzi, the For a camera man is not a film's
little shepherd boy who, alone sole creator, and to do justice
among the local inhabitants, is to this photography would h ave
friendly towa rds h er. Vigo, now needed a director in a million.
more than ever attracted and Leni Riefenstahl attempts the
mystified, sets off to find her, impossible with great resolution
and before long has installed and much artistry. She learnt
himself in h er hut. One day, enough from Fanck to let the
whilst painting her, he notices mountains, jagged mute Dolo-
a lump of crystal she is hand- mites, dominate the film and
ling, and that night follows her form part of life in the village,
up the mountain to the cave. lived w ith great simplicity by the
He r ealises that the rich crystal peasants, genuine close-ups of
deposits need be a menace to whose wonderful faces thread
the community no longer but a through the entire film giving
source of wealth, and induces it a remarkable fidelity to nature.
the peasants to reach the cave Indeed, nature stars in The Blue
a nd remove them in their big Light, doubtless as the director
baskets. Junta, discovering what intended. H er acting as Junta
h as happened, is heartbroken has maturity and, alternatively
and on her descent from the witch-like and quite strikingly
peak loosens her han.d-hold and beautiful, she convinces as the
drops to death. Vigo, too lat e, half-ma.d Junta. Mathia s
finds her body a mid the sum- Wieman responds well as Vigo,
mer flower s. The tale may per- and there is good support from
h a ps be read as a kind of fable, Beni Fuhrer as Tonio and Franz
implying that commercia l ex- Ma ldacea as Guzzi.
ploitation of nature may rob The B lue L ight survives in
man of an element of poetry, cinema. history largely because
as Junta's death robbed the of its visual attractions, a nd al-
painter of his inspiration. That though it borrowed from Eisen-
disenchantment, in short may stein and also Jean Epstein in
be dangerous. its portrayal of peasants in their
To portray such an unworldly daily lives amid natural sur-
story, Schneeberger uses his bril- roundings, it foreshadowed the
liance as a cameraman to the ut- present school of nature film-
most. Every artifice of carefully makers led by Arne Sucksdorff,
composed long-shot, striking many of whose shots in The
close-up, soft-focus, time-lapse Great Adv enture might have
photography (for the rising an.d been the earlier Schneeberger's.
setting of sun or moon), magica l And it is h a rd to believe that
handling of rocks, trees, water, Marcel Pagnol, in his later films
reflections, sunshine sha dow and of rugged P rovencal landscape
moonlight, mists and moving with figures, was not influenced
cloud, a nd above all sheer by it. But this apart, it remains
wizardry with his filters c0mbine as a feast for the eye, an intense
to make this film visually an screen poem.
t w en ty-five