KING OF HEARTS is a whimsical comic parable
by French director Philippe de Broca. Set in the French countryside
during World War I, the film focuses on a Scottish soldier, Private
Plumpick (Alan Bates), who comes to prefer the charmingly eccentric
insanity inside a local lunatic asylum to the full-scale insanity
of modern civilization at war outside.
 KING OF HEARTS is undoubtedly the best and
the best-known film of French director Philippe de Broca. Although
it was a commercial failure and received mixed reviews when it
was first released, KING OF HEARTS became a cult classic. Audiences
took it to heart, returning to see it again and again at revival
cinemas; the film reportedly played for several years at one
theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and became a similar favorite
in Seattle and Portland.
 The antiwar sentiments of de Broca's
World War I parable certainly contributed to the film's popularity
at the time of the United States' disillusionment with Vietnam,
but these sentiments do not entirely explain it. The appeal of
KING OF HEARTS has transcended contemporary vogue or passing
political trends, touching a chord in the hearts and minds of
those who have fallen under its spell and enduring through the
years.
The genesis of KING OF HEARTS
can be traced to de Broca's own military experience, when he
served as an army newsreel cameraman. He claimed that it was
Algeria that shifted his interest to comedy, after which he decided
that the real world was simply too ugly. The actual idea for
KING OF HEARTS came from a brief news article about fifty French
mental patients who had been killed by the Germans during World
War I after their hospital had been bombed. They had dressed
themselves in the uniforms of dead American soldiers and were
wandering through the countryside when the Germans shot them
by mistake.
As with many of his films, de
Broca spins an enchanting story from the slightest of premises.
The opening credits of this film appear over the sounds and dark
shapes of clockwork gears, as the titles synchronously wind into
view in a clever visual design. The dimly lit, ominous figure
of a knight in armor is recognizable in the shadows and strikes
the hour with its mace, thereby planting a clue at the outset
about the solution of the mystery which runs through the film.
- The Story -
It is October,
1918, in a small town in France. At dawn, several German soldiers
finish running a line of wire from the clock tower in the village
square, under the paving stones, to a concrete bunker in the
center, in which several huge bombs are visible before the blockhouse
is sealed with cement.
In an apartment nearby, the bald,
monocled, mustachioed Prussian General von Krack (played by de
Broca's screenwriter, Daniel Boulanger) is having his head shaved
by the local barber while he confides his strategy to his adjutant,
Lieutenant Hamburger (Marc Dudicourt). The Germans plan to evacuate
the town, leaving it mined with munitions, then blow it sky-high
when the advancing allies arrive to occupy it."Sir Lancelot
chimes at midnight," they gloat secretively as they prepare
to leave.(A young Private Adolf Hitler appears briefly, shouting,
"Shall we burn the town, sir?" "Later, Adolf,
later," the general replies, much to Hitler's disappointment.)
The barber, who has overheard
the plans, spreads word among the townspeople of the danger,
telling them to flee. Returning to his shop, the barber, who
is a spy for the Resistance, uses a concealed wireless to contact
the Allies. Using the code phrase, "Why don't mackerels
like potatoes?" he communicates part of the message, including
the warning, "Sir Lancelot chimes at midnight," before
he is discovered and shot by the retreating German soldiers.
 The commander of the Scottish
regiment, who receives the warning, Colonel MacBibenbrook (Adolfo
Celi), who is a red-haired, blundering, tea-sipping parody of
a British officer, decides to send a scout to ascertain the situation,
find the explosives, and disarm them. He chooses shy Private
Plumpick (Alan Bates), an ornithologist who reads the works of
William Shakespeare to his carrier pigeons.
Carrying a cage with two pigeons,
Private Plumpick approaches the nearly abandoned village. He
is spotted by a few remaining German soldiers and chased to an
insane asylum, where Plumpick disguises himself as one of the
inmates, who have been left behind by the villagers. Taking refuge
behind a magnificent house of cards built by two patients who
identify themselves as Bishop Hollyhocks (Julien Guiomar) and
the Duke of Clubs (Jean-Claude Brialy), Plumpick tells the Germans
that he is the "King of Hearts." The inmates instantly
accept his word and proclaim to the others that the King has
returned.
The Germans leave in fear, as
though insanity were contagious, and Plumpick cautiously follows.
The lunatics discover that the gates to the asylum have been
left open and wander into the town as gleefully as children escaping
from school, their wooden shoes clattering excitedly over the
cobblestones. Georges Delerue's beautiful, haunting music begins
as a wondrous transformation takes place. Bishop Hollyhocks enters
a cathedral, finding the scarlet robes and miters in the sacristy.
Another inmate, a wan, disheveled woman, Mme Eglantine (Micheline
Presle), brushes the dust from a vanity mirror in a bombed-out
building, peers at her face, and uses makeup from a drawer to
paint her lips and eyes, magically becoming a seductive courtesan.
A third invalid, clutching a naked doll whose hairless pate he
had compulsively combed in the ward, goes into the abandoned
barber's shop, dons a white smock and pompadour wig, and assumes
his role. Another becomes a "general" in a circus ringmaster's
uniform and opens the animal cages, setting the occupants free
(just as he has been liberated). The
"Duke of Clubs," elegantly attired in morning coat,
top hat, and carrying a cane, escorts his lovely "duchess"
(Francoise Christophe), shaded by a parasol (the two momentarily
posing in one of de Broca's wonted still-life tableaux before
strolling off together like an animated Impressionist painting).
The music builds to a crescendo of rapture over several aerial
shots of the tranquil town whose sunlit splendor makes it seem
enchanted.
 Plumpick finds the streets filled
with peculiar inhabitants, including a dancing girl in circus
costume, an aviator, vintage gendarmes, and an albino camel.
Puzzled, he makes his way to the barber shop, where he assumes
that the proprietor, M. Marcel (Michel Serrault), is the Resistance
agent and gives him the code phrase, "Why don't mackerels
like potatoes?" The crazy barber replies with equal logic
that he would bet that some of them do. Plumpick finds it odd
that the barber pays his customers and is told that he hates
to see the shop empty. When Plumpick surreptitiously asks where
the Germans are, the barber answers that he does not know, and
shouts helpfully, "Any Germans here?" Plumpick shushes
him, but the barber offers the fool's wisdom that "if one
talks loud enough, no one ever listens."
Seeking more information about
the hidden munitions, Plumpick finds General Geranium (Pierre
Brasseur) at the circus, but fares no better in another nonsensical
conversation. Plumpick gravely inquires what "Sir Lancelot
strikes at midnight" signifies. The general strokes his
beard and informs him that midnight is the middle of the night.
Plumpick suddenly notices that the lion's cage is open and that
one of the big cats is lounging inside, and he hurriedly slams
the door shut. It is only then that the lion attacks, trying
to get out as Plumpick locks the bolt in the nick of time. The
general, however (like all the lunatics in the town), remains
blissfully unaware of any danger, protected by his perfect innocence
- a theme reminiscent of Marcel Carne's LES ENFANTS DU PARADIS
(1945; CHILDREN OF PARADISE), when the wife of the mime Baptiste
says that he is like a dreamer sleepwalking on the rooftops.
If one calls to him and awakens him, he will fall, but leaving
him alone will ensure that he returns home safe and sound.
- The Germans Arrive -
Plumpick
soon realizes that all the town's inhabitants are strange dreamers,
and sends two messages back to headquarters via his carrier pigeons.
The first, describing what he has found, sounds like gibberish
to the Scottish colonel, who believes that his campaign is now
in the hands of a lunatic. The second message is intercepted
by the Germans. They are alarmed to learn that the bunker has
disappeared, and return to have a look.
In the village, Plumpick sees
the men sneaking into Mme Eglantine's bordello and follows them.
He tries to warn the courtesan of their danger, but she, too,
is unfazed. She tells him that "all they have is the present,
and there is nothing else to own." She offers Plumpick a
young virgin, Columbine (Genevieve Bujold), to whom he is attracted.
She asks him what he desires, and he replies, "A simple
loss of memory." Columbine smiles and leads him upstairs,
but before she can grant his wish, the King of Hearts is whisked
away to the cathedral for his coronation, conveyed in a carriage
that is festooned with ostrich plumes and drawn by a white camel.
The Germans arrive during this
bizarre processional and are greeted with cheers and confetti.
While the bordello whores sing in the cathedral choir for the
coronation, Plumpick watches the soldiers, following them to
the square where they check the tower and camouflaged bunker.
Meanwhile, the barber and the
general hijack two of the German armored vehicles and race around
the village, chasing each other. Plumpick watches from the tower
as the soldiers take flight, then rings the carillon bells like
Salvatore Quasimodo, laughing madly and descending to the ground
on a rope. When he tries to break into the bunker and defuse
the explosives, the blockhouse remains impenetrable. The lunatics
gather to watch his futile efforts, and the king chastises them,
yelling that they are all going to die unless he can find the
clock wired to the fuse. His subjects dutifully bring him a vast
array of antique timepieces, setting them at his feet.
- "Who made you a king?"
-
With no
other recourse, Plumpick, seated astride a white horse, tries
to lead the inhabitants away from the doomed town. As they reach
the city gates, Dilerue's musical theme stops, replaced by the
distant thunder of war, and the inmates shrink back, urging the
king to stay with them. They warn him that the countryside is
full of wild beasts, and that "there is murder in their
hearts." Plumpick wants to leave, but cannot; the sight
of the pitiful figures on the village walls causes him to return."Long
live the king, on my word as a duke!" the duke proclaims."Who
made you a duke?" Plumpick asks querulously."Who made
you a king?" the duke answers evenly."But my poor friend,
you were all in the nuthouse only a few hours ago," Plumpick
continues, ruefully trying to pierce their complacency. "Jealous?"
the duke inquires, "And where were you yesterday?"
The logic of the lunatics is unassailable.
 Unable to save them or abandon
them, Plumpick resigns himself to enjoying the remaining time
with Columbine in a bedroom before a crackling fireplace. The
others promenade across the lawns in the setting sunlight, while
the duke and duchess rest contentedly on a park bench. As midnight
approaches, Plumpick sighs that he has only three minutes left
to live. Columbine's face lights up at the wonder of such a precious
gift. Then by chance she happens to tell him about the knight
inside the clock who will strike the hour. Plumpick suddenly
divines the mystery of Sir Lancelot and hurriedly climbs the
tower. Struggling with the mechanical knight, he stops the fateful
blow with his head and averts the catastrophe at the last moment.
The Scottish soldiers watching
the town see midnight pass with no explosion and enter the village
as victors, celebrating with a dazzling display of fireworks.
The retreating Germans spot the skyrockets, and, believing that
their plan has succeeded, also return.
At dawn, the Germans march into
the square as the Scots move out, almost missing each other.
Then Columbine tosses a fateful bouquet which draw the attention
of both sides. They quickly form up and shoot at one another,
down to the two commanders, whose horses peacefully gallop off
together. The general remarks that they seem to be overdoing
it a bit.
Wearying of the game, and with
more Allied forces approaching, the inmates return to the asylum,
shedding their costumes along the way. The town is reoccupied
and the townspeople take up their normal places again. Private
Plumpick, the sole survivor of the massacre, is awarded a medal
and sent back into action immediately. The Germans are holding
another village, he is told by a new commanding officer, and
they are going to blow it sky high.
This final irony is the last straw
for Plumpick, who deserts from a troop truck. Shedding his uniform,
as the inmates did their clothing, he rings for admission at
the gates of the asylum, standing naked before the startled nuns
and holding only his caged pigeon. Between the gentle insanities
of those within and the horrifyingly real ones without, he prefers
the former.
- Harmless Dreamers -
KING OF HEARTS has a gemlike quality, a poetic
fragility as beautiful and evanescent as the elaborate house
of cards the inmates build. De Broca's lunatics are harmless
dreamers who are more eccentric than seriously disturbed. Like
Shakespeare's wise fools, they possess a greater understanding
of life than those who are supposedly sane. Their calm acceptance
of impending death and their refusal to share Plumpick's fear
demonstrate a nobility of soul. They cheerfully renounce the
mortal obsession with tomorrow in favor of enjoying the moment.
Unwilling to face a world which terrifies and confuses them,
they retreat instead to the realm of the imagination, where they
can be whoever and whatever they want.
 De Broca artfully and cinematically
differentiates their universe from the "real" one.
Unlike the individualistic free spirits of the mental patients,
the soldiers of both armies are bound by rigid conformity, following
orders blindly, against their wishes and against common sense.
Their drab uniforms and barren surroundings are photographed
in dark, monochromatic tones as opposed to the colorful costumes
and profusion of lavish fin de siecle ornamentation which
surrounds the lunatics. Even the frenetic behavior of the military
is counterpointed by the leisurely, florid nature and lilting
poetic speeches of the mad. Plumpick, the man in between, who
has found a doomed paradise, is both tender and whimsical, delightful
and melancholy at the same time. This bittersweet contrast is
a de Broca trademark, giving an unusual resonance to his pictures.
The film is built from a series
of brief vignettes and episodes, approaching the story from every
angle rather than attempting to tell a larger story on a broader
scale. As with most of de Broca's works, the slender premise
of KING OF HEARTS is deceptively simple. The fragments are strung
together in chains of irony and humor, whose cumulative effect
remains memorable as an epiphany in the mind of the viewer.
©Magill's Survey of Cinema,
06-15-1995.
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