Every week Nicotina brings us an unforgettable female character from the movies. A girl you just can’t miss. This week, Nicotina suggests you meet Denise from Henri-Georges Clouzot’s French film Le Corbeau (The Raven), 1943.
Dr. Germain (Hero): People don’t change. A decent man remains a decent man and …
Denise (NOT the ‘family values’ heroine): and a girl remains a slut? Perhaps you’re right doctor. But then I pity you. You’ll always represent what’s dismal and most alien in life.
Dr. Germain: An idiot?
Denise: (laughs) Oh no. A bourgeois.
Ginette Leclerc as Denise in Henri-Georges Clouzot’s film is a character as beguiling and atypical as this film, made during the occupation. Leclerc is more Bette Davis than Bette Davis and is the definitive B&W femme fatale in the beginning, but we’re not so sure in the end. A sympathetic characterization of a ‘bad’ woman who not only seduces the hero but also attempts an abortion continues to be rare more than half a century later and definitely finds no parallel in its time.
The key to the whole film rests on a close-up of Denise towards the end when she asks the hero to look into her eyes so that he can see that she is not guilty. If you focus on that spectacular teary-eyed close-up of this uninhibited character, you’ll be left without the crutch of the stereotyping point-of-view shot and see the potential of spectatorial freedom that direct perception can allow.