Pasteur (film, 1935)

The film consists of a prologue and five paintings. In the prologue, Sasha Guitri reads a letter to Louis Pasteur , who is about to instill a rabies virus , to herself, who says: “ Once you try to work, you can’t live without work. Need to work. There is nothing but work. Only it brings real joy and helps to endure the hardships of life and anxiety ” ^[1] . Gitri shows photographs of the places where Pasteur spent his childhood, portraits of his parents, paintings painted by a future scientist at age 13, lists his first discoveries and beginnings. After this introduction, a biographical movie drama begins, consisting of 5 paintings in chronological order.

1870 year . The patriotic Louis Pasteur is concerned about the approach of the Franco-Prussian war . His students talk among themselves about how they worship their teacher and scientist. After the outbreak of war and the declaration of war, Pasteur says goodbye to several students going to the front.

1880 year . At the Paris Medical Academy, Pasteur angrily and passionately opposed conservative scholars accusing him of amateurism and questioning his discovery, in connection with which the president of the academy was forced to adjourn the meeting. One of the doctors present considers himself insulted by the statements of Pasteur and sends him two seconds with a challenge to a duel. Pasteur calls this step ridiculous and suggests deleting his words from the minutes of the meeting, but at the same time he does not refuse them. The President gives Pasteur the Legion of Honor , and the chemist learns that he was unanimously elected to the French Academy , but immediately warns that this status will in no way be able to change his behavior.

1885 year . In French Alsace, the boy Joseph Meister was bitten by a rabid dog. Grandfather takes him to Pasteur, who did not even imagine that the first patient who would have to undergo a course of treatment for rabies according to his method would be a child. The doctor, since it is well known that Pasteur was never officially a doctor and had no medical education, for which he was attacked by his opponents, injects the boy with a rabies vaccine developed in the microbiologist’s laboratory, and the scientist restlessly spends the night watching his condition the patient. To the relief of Pasteur and his assistants, two weeks after vaccination, the boy becomes better and he is recovering well.
1888 year . A physician, Pasteur’s friend, visits him in the villa at the request of the scientist’s relatives concerned about his well-being, and advises him to protect his health and rest. Pasteur decides that his days are numbered, and the hard work of many years will be jeopardized with his death. He is relieved to learn that he will live for a long time, but only if he agrees to abide by the regime and temporarily pause his work. Joseph Meister, who has completely recovered after a course of treatment, is visiting him, who brings a book that he received as a reward, which Pasteur was deeply moved and moved by.

December 1892 The apotheosis of Pasteur, as a scientific and public figure. At the University of Paris , ceremonies are held dedicated to the scientist’s seventieth birthday, to which Joseph Lister , the founder of antiseptics , is invited to thank him. Pasteur accepts solemn congratulations from the President of the Third Republic, Sadi Carnot , as well as scientists, representatives and delegations from around the world ^[2] .

The biographical film about Louis Pasteur is the first full-fledged feature film directed by Sasha Guitry ^[2] , which shot it only in 1935 and already in the era of sound cinema . Usually his late arrival in cinema is explained by the fact that in a silent movie, Guitry could not fully express himself by transmitting his famous long-lasting and sparkling wit dialogues that were characteristic of his dramatic work and were his “brand name” ^[3] . Sasha Guitry made his debut as a playwright in 1905 at the age of 25, after which he became a famous and popular playwright in his plays and created his own special "theater", which French critics singled out in the so-called "Sasha Guitry genre" ^[4] . After this film, he will film 30 of his plays out of about 130, for each writing his own script; in criticism, his films were called "canned theater" ^{[5] [6]} .

Guitry created the play with the aim of reconciliation and in deference to his illustrious father Lucien Guitry , a star of the French and Russian theater, who was closely acquainted with Pasteur and successfully played this role in the Vaudeville Theater in 1919 ^[2] . Before that, Guitry had created two biographical plays: Jean de Lafontaine (1916) and Deburo (1918) ^[2] .

In addition to the fact that this play is dedicated to the biography of the scientist, it is also distinguished by the fact that it lacks female characters, and this is not very characteristic of the playwright Guitry, and in particular he was widely known as an expert on the female soul: “Studying in detail his beloved and perhaps the only plot is the constant evolution of a female character ” ^{[4] [2]} . The critic Paul Leoto, one of Guitry’s most devoted fans of dramatic art, doesn’t hide his disappointment in his article and speaks unusually harsh of the play, Pasteur himself (who “perhaps invented this disease [rabies] more than a cure for it” ») And the game of Lucien Guitry. French film expert Jacques Lursell noted that, surprisingly, the reproach of Guitri, made to him by Leoto in 1919, that with this play he "falls to the level of cinema tapes" ^[2] .

Despite the fact that this picture is his first full-fledged work, close acquaintance with the cinema began two decades before the filming of the Pasteur film, when, starting in 1912, he began to film famous films of his father’s friends ( O. Rodin , O. Renoir , C. Monet , A. France ), thus discovering the possibilities of a movie camera ^[7] .

The proposal for the film adaptation of the play came from the director and producer Fernand River ( French Fernand Rivers ). In his biographical book “Fifty Years Among the Mad Men (1894-1944)” ^{[8], the} River dwells on working together on this film with Guitre. Initially, it was planned to shoot as many as two films that could be shown in movie theaters in a twin session, but due to poor reception from the public, this project had to be abandoned. The film was created and produced by Productions Maurice Lehmann and Films Fernand Rivers.

The film was released on September 20, 1935 at Cinéma Colisée , but was unsuccessful, and even failed in Dolé 's hometown of Pasteur ^[2] . In connection with the failure at the box office, the producer and actually co-director of the film, Fernand River, even expressed regret that he did not ask Guitri to film another more characteristic play for him. However, Guitry himself was pleased with the experience gained during the creation of this film, which was reflected in the quatrain dedicated to its producer:

According to Lursel, Pasteur’s biography occupies a “marginal position in Guitry’s theatrical heritage”, and when it is screened, it already contains many elements that are characteristic of the director’s later work:

The picture has a clear pacifist message and glorifies labor as a source of joy ^[2] . Pasteur in this film in many respects has a non-canonical image of a traditional scientist personifying wisdom and calm calm, and appears in the performance of Gitri as an impulsive, painfully sensitive person, close in his psychological warehouse to an artist, an artist who were well known to the director and performer of the main role and who repeatedly deduced them in his dramatic work. So, in almost every scene, Pasteur is in an extremely emotional state: anxiety, rage, fear, tenderness or appreciation. According to Lursel, the composition of the picture created by Guitry gives her the appearance of “an ardent melodrama where the pastoral image, with all its intransigence and theatricality, is brought to the heights of the beautiful” ^[2] .

The playwright and director returned to Pasteur’s theme, staging his first performance in France occupied by the Nazis , and ended it with the patriotic Marseillaise ^[5] . In addition, the film Comedian (French: Le Comédien, 1948) contains references to his relationship with his father and to the story of the creation of the play ^[2] .

• Pasteur is a French film directed by Jean Epstein in 1922.
• The Tale of Louis Pasteur is an American film directed by William Dieterle in 1935.

• Lursell, Jacques . Pasteur / Pasteur // Film Encyclopedia. - SPb. : Rosebud Publishing, 2009.- T. 1.- S. 674-678. - ISBN 978-5-904175-02-3.
• Efimova S. I. “The Parisian spirit” Sasha Guitry: “Enfant gâté”, “philosophy of pleasure”, or the boulevard of the art square in St. Petersburg (1910-1917) // Theater. Painting. Cinema. Music. - 2015. - No. 2. - P. 23-40.
• Sasha Guitry . "Memoirs of a cheater" and more / Translation from French, compilation and introduction by O. V. Zakharova. - M .: Art, 1999 .-- 494 p. - ISBN 5-210-01402-9.

• " Pasteur " on the Internet Movie Database