La Chienne 07/16 Blu-ray (Rental)

Jean Renoir s ruthless love triangle tale, his second sound film, is a true precursor to his brilliantly bitter The Rules of the Game, displaying all of the filmmaker s visual genius and fully imbued with his profound sense of humanity. A hangdog Michel Simon (Boudu Saved from Drowning) cuts a tragic figure as an unhappily married cashier and amateur painter who becomes so smitten with a prostitute that he refuses to see the obvious: that she and her pimp boyfriend are taking advantage of him. Renoir s elegant compositions and camera movements carry this twisting and turning narrative a stinging commentary on class and sexual divides to an unforgettably ironic conclusion.