After finally being able to watch an English Subtitled version of the magnificent Film Noir The She-Wolves (1957),I was told by fellow IMDber dbdumonteil about another Boileau-Narcejac adaptation,this time by Henri Decoin. Finding Decoin's Beating Heart (1940) to be very elegant, I got set to find out where the truth lies.

View on the film:

Gliding along the floor towards François like a Gothic Horror queen, Juliette Gréco gives a mesmerising performance as Myriam. Calling François over to her as a Femme Fatale siren,Gréco keeps Myriam's spikes pointed,with every abrasive off-the-cuff line she unleashes,increasing François's lust for her. Holding François and maid Ronga (played by a very good Mathé Mansoura in her lone credit-one of the few times a black person is given a prominent role) from entering her personal space, Gréco holds Myriam's cards tight,and pulls on the ambiguity of no one being able to get up close and personal with her.

Finding more than a leopard when he visits to care for Myriam's pet, Jean-Marc Bory gives an excellent turn as Film Noir loner François, whose fresh-faced innocent love for his wife Bory chisels down to fear and lust over the spell Myriam's cast on his heart. Finding her husband to become distant,Liselotte Pulver tenderly has Catherine sink into a sickness which raises François doubts over his secret love.

Tightening the web Myriam and François are held in, co-writer/(with Albert Husson) director Henri Decoin crisply adapts Boileau-Narcejac's novel, (which runs as an extended flashback,left out in the film version) with the writers exploring the paranoia at the heart of all Boileau-Narcejac adaptation, via François never being fully relaxed around Myriam and always having his back up against the wall, held in a vice-like grip of doubt by the writers,over the at face value love from Myriam. Holding Catherine up ill in bed, the writers turn the screws on Myriam's tropical past and unravel her suspected spells that cast out to François the choice to sink or swim in the Film Noir ocean.

Filmed on Noirmoutier Island at a time when the only way to reach the island was via a periodically flooded causeway called The Passage Du Gois (a bridge was built in 1971) director Henri Decoin & cinematographer Marcel Grignon fly above the Gois in a dazzling opening shot that brings impending doom onto the island. On the Film Noir shore, Decoin stylishly uses strands of light (backed by a sharp, Jazzy score from Pierre Henry) to brew a supernatural (not horror) atmosphere transfixing François. Leaving the Noir open-ended, Decoin follows François in a wide shot to where the truth lies.

On Noirmoutier Island,The Passage Du Gois, a periodically flooded causeway is unique in the world for its length (4.5km),. Its 9 signals provide sanctuary to the more reckless who are taken by surprise as the water rises.(Tourist Office)Noirmoutier has been connected to mainland France by bridge since 1971-the film was made in 1962 ,so the only way to the island was the Gois.

Henri Decoin's Films Noirs of the second half of the fifties were only a pale reflection of his great movies ("Non Coupable" "La Fille Du Diable " " Les Inconnus Dans La Maison" ....)But in 1962,out of the blue, "Maléfices" nearly matched Decoin's heyday ,with its deadly charm,its oppressive atmosphere, its sense of mystery ,and unabashed confidence when the overrated Nouvelle Vague was ruling.Given inspiring material, the director could still rise to the occasion.

And the material is first-class: a diabolic(!) suspense by Boileau- Narcejac :must it be repeated that ,without them "Les Diaboliques" and "Vertigo" would never have existed ?

The movie begins with a long panoramic shot on the famous Gois (see above)enhanced by a lugubrious ominous score .François ,married to Catherine ,lives in Beauvoir/Mer .He is a vet surgeon and he travels all over the region ,in his Deux-Chevaux car .The first scene (not from the novel) shows a peasant whose cow is sick: he does not really believe in science ,but he does think there is a curse on his cattle .François does not take it seriously and however...

Called on Noirmoutier island to treat a sick leopard ,the vet meets a mysterious attractive woman,Myriam .Almost reluctantly ,he becomes her lover in a house where a statuette and disturbing paintings made by the owner who was born and lived in Africa for years seem to have maleficent powers .Myriam,jealous and possessive does not want to share her lover with his wife .And because of a strange (tropical?) disease , Catherine falls into the well:although she survived the "accident" she becomes sicker and sicker: illness or poisoning?Or did Myriam cast a spell on her? The disturbing woman wants to return to Africa and François to follow her there.Having read books provided by a strange doctor,François begins to believe in black magic power.The only way to save his wife would be to break the spell while following his mistress ...

Decoin takes advantage of the filming on location (the tragedy on the Gois is a model of simplicity and efficiency),he makes the Noirmoutier landscapes as threatening as Henri Calef did in 1949 with Le Mont Saint Michel in "Eaux Troubles" .And those who read the book will agree that Juliette Greco was the ideal choice (I cannot think of another actress in the part of this sexy witch ).

Against all odds ,and without writing a spoiler,one can go as far to write that "Malefices" is a story of Amour Fou ;and when it's over ,the viewer will not really know who really killed who.

The novel begins with a confession the hero sends to the police and the story is a long flashback.However the screenwriters did a very good adaptation,to creditable effect.

"Maléfices " was Henri Decoin's (short-lived ) renaissance.It's his only worthwhile effort in the sixties ,and it is a sparkling black diamond,the lost great thriller of the era.

Like this? try these...

"La Cage" Robert Darène 1963

"Rosemary's baby" Roman Polanski 1968 (note the similarities when François reads the black magic books.)

If you loved "Les Diaboliques" and "Vertigo", thanks to Boileau-Narcejac stories and masters Clouzot and Hitchcock direction, you'll necessarily love "Maléfices" adapted from the same authors and directed by another master of French Film Noir, Henri Decoin ("Non Coupable", "La Fille Du Diable", "Enre Onze Heures Et Minuit", "La Vérité Sur Bébé Donge", "Razzia Sur La Chnouf", "l'Affaire Des Poisons" among the best ones, often written by himself). "Maléfices" is a bewitching love story, a real spiral to damnation, set on an island linked to the french Atlantic coast with the famous Passage du Gois, long road sometimes covered by the high tide with shelters all along for people who didn't watch for the hours of the high tide. Even if the casting isn't as great as in "Les Diaboliques", everybody's fully convincing, Juliette Gréco in first place. "Maléfices" is another unknown gem of French Film Noir, unforgettable.