The Schpountz (1938)

“The Tropical Anchovy”, introduction scene with Fernandel, Fernand Charpin, Odette Roger, and Jean Castan.

Synopsis

A young grocer’s clerk with a bit of a penchant for mythology, Irénée is convinced that he will become a famous actor. He meets a film crew that tells him a cruel joke. He arrives at the studios full of hope…

“Schpountz” means simple-minded. As we would say in Marseille: he is a “fada”, we can say: he is a “schpountz”…

“When you make people laugh on stage or on screen, you don’t lower yourself, on the contrary. Laughing at those who come back from the fields, with their big hands so hard that they can’t close them anymore, those who come out of the office with their little chests that don’t know the taste of air anymore, those who come back from the factory, with their heads down, their nails broken, with black oil in the cuts of their fingers…

To make all those who will die laugh, to make all those who have lost their mother, or who will lose her, laugh…

Laughter is not a kind of absurd and vulgar convulsion but a human thing that perhaps God has given to men to console them for being intelligent.”

Marcel Pagnol

Technical data

Genre: Comedy
Duration: 2h03
Director: Marcel Pagnol
Script and dialogues: Marcel Pagnol
Image: Willy Faktorovitch (designated Willy)
Cameraman: Roger Ledru
Camera assistant: Henri Dariès
Sets: Marius Brouquier
Sound: Marcel Levoignat (studio), Jean Lecoq (exterior)
Editing: Suzanne de Troye, Suzanne Cabon, assistant Jeannette Ginestet
Music: Casimir Oberfeld
Song: Je n’ai jamais compris l’amour ou l’amour incompris, lyrics by Jean Manse
Set photographer: Roger Corbeau
Production: Marcel Pagnol
Production company: Société Nouvelle des Films Marcel Pagnol
Production manager: Charles Pons, assistant Léon Bourrely
Stage Manager: Henri Garcia
Distribution: Gaumont