Le Point du jour (1949)
Directed by Louis Daquin

Film Review

The cinema of Louis Daquin is the cinema of solidarity.  Two of his early films, Nous les gosses (1941) and Premier de cordée (1944), are centred on the need for collective action to achieve an outcome that is beyond the resources of one individual, and Daquin touches on the same theme in most of his other films.  Le Point du Jour, Daquin's most political feature, is nothing less than an impassioned tribute to workers' solidarity, made in the intermediate aftermath of one of the biggest incidents of strike action ever to hit France.  Three million men and women participated in the national strikes of 1947, which affected a wide range of industries that included mining.  The strikes were largely in protest against the Marshall Plan, which gave the impression that the French government was subservient to the interests of the United States as part of a wider European reconstruction programme after the Second World War.  Daquin directly references the 1947 strike, and the one that came about one year later, in his documentary short, La Grande lutte des mineurs, but this film was banned by the government before it was released.

Le Point du Jour owes its blistering authenticity to the fact that it was shot entirely on location in Liévin, an important mining town in the north of France, near to Calais where Daquin was born.  Possibly inspired by the Italian neo-realists, Daquin uses real locations and real miners to give his film a grim and gritty sense of reality, a world apart from the polished fictional dramas that French cinema audiences would have been used to at the time.  The film's strength lies in its stark and frighteningly unfamiliar visuals, which leave a lasting impression.  Whilst the natural landscape on the surface is visibly disfigured by the mining paraphernalia, it retains an eerie beauty, with enormous stacks of coal in the background seeming to look like carefully sculptured pyramids.  By contrast, what we see underground is grimly hellish - unfeasibly narrow, barely lit galleries in which men and boys must spend long, tiring days ripping the precious black mineral from the place it has dwelled in for millions of years.  The film could have worked as a straight documentary, but Daquin and his writer Vladimir Pozner chose instead to give it a dramatic backbone involving characters played by professional actors, one of whom is Michel Piccoli in his first screen role.

The characters are clearly all archetypes, each intended to represent an idea, but they are so skilfully drawn and well portrayed that they become as grubbily tangible as the world they inhabit.  René Lefèvre's dour mine boss represents the prevailing management mentality of the time, one that believes in a strict hierarchy which imposes order and disciple from the top down, to ensure that the workers are governed by an iron hand for their own good.  Jean Desailly's character, significantly younger and more amiable than Lefevre's, represents an alternative that Daquin clearly sees as a model for the future - the kind of manager who engages with the workforce and understands their concerns.   The friendship that Desailly forges with one of the miners towards the end of the film is symbolic of a new solidarity that will bring workers and management together for their mutual advantage, although the film frankly admits that the process of breaking down the barriers between the two sides will take some time.

Solidarity between the miners is the film's main theme and this is underscored by the decision of a 14-year-old boy to remain a miner even though he has just narrowly escaped being crushed to death in a mining accident.  The dangers inherent in mining are pointedly expressed in an extended flashback depicting a pit disaster that took place forty years previously and claimed over three hundred lives.  In fact, the incident referred to was the infamous Courrières mining disaster of 1906, in which over a thousand miners lost their lives.  The name of the mine and the actual number of casualties were both struck from the script at the insistence of the owners of the mine where Daquin shot his film.  There were many more compromises that Daquin had to accept so that his film could be completed.

It isn't only boys with no obvious career alternatives who are expected to go down the pit to support their families; women who are not fully occupied keeping the homes of their husbands and sons must also work for the mining company, most probably sorting the coal to ensure it is of an acceptable standard.  As well as the hazards of their work, the film also touches on the miners' frustrations away from the pit, in particular the difficulty in finding accommodation and starting a family.  Despite the obvious hardship and dangers they have to endure - something that Daquin never lets us forget for a second - the miners appear to be not only content with their lot but actually fulfilled, mindful of their important role in securing the prosperity and future well-being of the nation.

Le Point du jour doesn't conceal the fact that it is a piece of leftwing propaganda, but its authors concern for their fellow man is so genuine and so keenly expressed that the film acquires a deeper human dimension that transcends its obvious political purpose.  Solidarity isn't just a matter of militant workers ganging together to safeguard their own interest; it is the means by which individuals in all spheres of human activity can attain their full potential and help forge a better world.  The film's importance as a historical document is pretty self-evident, but its core theme extolling the virtues of collective endeavour has a very modern ring to it.

Film Synopsis

A mining community in the north of France...  A young engineer Larzac begins work at the mine and soon takes objection to the management's authoritarian treatment of the miners.  His more experienced superior, Dubard, insists that authority is necessary to inspire trust.  Determined to change things, Larzac strikes up a friendship with one of the miners, Marles, although the latter doubts whether the wall separating the miners from the management will ever be breached.  Are the managers even aware of the precarious and difficult lives that most miners have to endure?   Georges and Marie desperately want to get married, but their plans are frustrated by the scarcity of housing.  Against her future husband's wishes, Marie insists that she carries on working as a coal sorter, so that Roger, her 14-year-old brother, will not have to go down the pit.  Although the boy is at first reluctant to follow in his father's footsteps, in the end he has no choice in the matter.  He is very nearly killed in a rock fall but, as he recovers in hospital, he insists he will never give up his job in the mine...