Gribiche (film)

Gribiche is a 1926 French silent film directed by Jacques Feyder based on the eponymous short story by writer Frédéric Boutet.

In a Paris department store where he had gone to buy something for his mother, a young boy, Gribiche, finds a handbag that a lady has just lost.

Gribiche lives with his mother, a young widow of war and factory worker, in a small apartment in the popular neighbourhood of Grenelle.

Gribiche then discovers another universe: a big mansion in the select neighbourhood of Auteuil furnished in the fashionable Art Déco style; and a strict daily schedule, surrounded by hostile servants and private teachers.

Cut off from his family, his friends and street life, Gribiche gets bored except when he can take refuge in the garage, where he learns about mechanics from the lady's chauffeur.

His attention was brought by his wife, actress Françoise Rosay, who had already been his assistant for Faces of Children, to the short story Gribiche by Frédéric Boutet.

Great attention was brought to the details of the decoration and the opening credits refer in particular to furniture and crystals by Louis Sue and André Mare and silverware by Jean Puiforcat.

[3] Mitry considers that the film only highlights the aggressive modernism of Süe and Mare and deplores the excessive lengthening of a misplaced plot in the unnecessary development of scenes without purpose.

Gribiche (1926)
C. Guyon, F. Rosay & J. Forest