Louis Malle was only twenty-five years old when he directed “Lift to the Scaffold”, a cult film of 1958, passed to history as one of the cornerstones of the Nouvelle Vague. A throbbing film, which combines Pathos and Eros, Love and Crime. And, in the background, Miles Davis’s Immortal Soundtrack.
A film, an epochal soundtrack
People usually say that when Miles Davis was commissioned by Louis Malle to compose a soundtrack for his film, “Lift to the Scaffold”, the jazz trumpeter improvised on the scenes not yet assembled. The result was so extraordinary that, in this beautiful noir with Jeanne Moureau, the silences became talkative.
There is little talk in “Ascenseur pour the Echafaud”, people only speak the right. To build the atmosphere, much more often, is the trumpet of Miles Davis, which dictates the times.
Because, in this film of 1958, the leitmotiv is the anguish that the characters live, aware of having committed a planned crime, and the fact that they found themselves in a vortex from which it will be difficult to get out.
On one hand there is Julien Tavernier, played by Maurice Ronet. On the other hand, there is Florence Carana, played by Jeanne Moureau.
The two plan the murder of her husband, an unscrupulous businessman enriched during the wars of French decolonization, first in Indochina and then in Algeria. It’s Tavernier who kills him. Florence reassures him with a sweet voice, on the phone, before the killing: “I love you, Julien. Don’t be afraid, I’ll be close to you. ”
This image is the one that more than any other was an inspiration to describe the wines tasted during our experience at the Casoli Estates.
Nymphs and satyrs
Nymphs and satyrs are minor deities of the Greek tradition, and in the label of all the products of Casoli Estate there is a bucolic scene representing them. In it, a nymph squeezes the grape juice into the mouth of the satyr. The Casoli family chose this image because the producers consider wine as a form of art and pleasure.
The nymphs of mythology usually mated not infrequently with mortal men and demigods. That’s why they are considered as a symbol of sensuality and fertility. Because the nymphs are seductive, irresistible.
And that love between Julien and Florence is really a love that comes from the fact that Julien is seduced by the wife of Mr. Carana.
She promises that she will be close to him in this gesture, and Julien, dreaming of a future with her, commits the murder that will give way to the basic vicissitudes of the plot. Killed Carala, Julien flees, but as he is about to start his car, he realizes that a rope dangles from the balcony of the window where his victim lies.
His decision to return to recover, however, will leave him prisoner of the elevator of the palace, because the caretaker, going away, detaches the electricity meter and leaves Julien trapped.
The sense of a movie that’s milestone and wine of Casoli Family
We will not expose how the film goes on and we invite you to watch it.
Louis Malle is one of the greatest exponents of the Nouvelle Vague, and Jeanne Moureau was one of the most distinguished actresses. In addition, Davis’s soundtrack is unmissable and the way the film is shot is very modern.
We tell you, however, that wine and film are well matched, because the Casoli family itself considers the wine also as something that can protect from the disenchantment of life.
The film is, basically, the awakening of French society after the vicissitudes of World War II.
France hoped to rise to the ultimate role of Great Power, but it was forced to contend with a very different reality. First, there is the rearmament of West Germany in an antisoviet function, then there is decolonization.
Love, instead, protects people from this disenchantment just as a glass of wine can temporarily isolate men from the hardness of everyday life.
A revolutionary message!
