Renoir introduces Elena as a "fantasy musical". The opening scene is in an artist's studio while a piano is practiced on. There is a superior use of depth of field but Bergman is the focal point (Renoir was quite smitten with her as evidenced by their years of personal communication). There are shades of Nana however that may have marred positive response to the film upon release. Bergman's character is not imbued with a clear motivation that brings everything around her into focus. It is simply her external self that is to be that which is focused upon. Well, that wasn't good enough in 1926 and nothing much had changed thirty years later. Is Bergman's Elena a symbol or a mere good luck charm? Hard to tell at first viewing. Again multiple cuts replace the long take and tableau construction of mise-en-scene replaces mobile framing. Elena is certainly not in the realm of 'realism' attributed to Regle. Point in case is when an old military jacket is commented as being tattered yet is clearly immaculate and freshly dry-cleaned at the other end of the studio minutes before. The immaculate mise-en-scene of the color "trilogy" is a psychologically-based construction and operates as a reflective process for the spectator to find pleasure in an unblemished vision. In effect, Renoir has shifted from letting a story tell itself through his direction to directing how the story is projected. "Everyone has their plans" replaces the old Renoir credo of "everyone has their reasons" and the distinction fits nicely with my own thesis about Renoir's two stylistic systems. In Carrefour, the camera investigates through the lattice work of a door window creating a layered space whereas in Elena an idle courter bangs in futility at a door with similar lattice but no great depth of field. For Faulkner, it is a conflict of private and public spheres at play where the woman's power is effected through performance. It seems unlikely that this theory plays out cleanly given Renoir's consistency with empowering female characters through a variety of means. The film has more significance and less entertainment value the more you know and understand of Renoir's oeuvre.

After watching two of his silent shorts, 'Elena and her Men (1956)' is my first feature-length film from French director Jean Renoir, and I quite enjoyed it. However, I didn't watch the film for Renoir, but for star Ingrid Bergman, who – at age 41 – still radiated unsurpassed beauty, elegance and charm. Throughout the early 1950s, following her scandalous marriage to Italian Roberto Rossellini, Bergman temporarily fell out of public favour. Her next five films, directed by her husband, were unsuccessful in the United States, and I suspect that Renoir's latest release did little to enhance Bergman's popularity with English-speaking audiences {however, she did regain her former success with an Oscar in the same year's 'Anastasia (1956)'}. She stars as Elena Sokorowska, a Polish princess who sees herself as a guardian angel of sorts, bringing success and recognition to promising men everywhere, before promptly abandoning them. While working her lucky charms to aid the political aspirations of the distinguished General Francois Rollan (Jean Marais), she finds herself falling into a love that she won't be able to walk away from. This vaguely-political film works well as either a satire or a romantic comedy, as long as you don't take it too seriously; it's purely lighthearted romantic fluff.Filmed in vibrant Technicolor, 'Elena and her Men' looks terrific as well, a flurry of bright colours, characters and costumes. Bergman's Polish princess is dreamy and somewhat self-absorbed, not in an unlikable way, but hardly a woman of high principles and convictions. She is persuaded by a team of bumbling government conspirators to convince General Rollan to stage a coup d'état, knowingly exploiting his love for her in order to satisfy her own delusions as a "guardian angel." Perhaps the film's only legitimately virtuous character is Henri de Chevincourt (Mel Ferrer, then Audrey Hepburn's husband), who ignores everybody else's selfish secondary motives and pursues Elena for love, and love alone. This, Renoir proudly suggests, is what the true French do best. 'Elena and her Men' also attempts, with moderate success, to expose the superficiality of upper-class French liaisons, through the clumsy philandering of Eugène (Jacques Jouanneau), who can't make love to his servant mistress without his fiancè walking in on them. For these sequences, Renoir was obviously trying for the madcap sort of humour that you might find in a Marx Brothers film, but the film itself is so relaxed and laid-back that the energy just isn't there.

The first half hour or so of this movie I liked. The obvious budding romance between Ingrid Bergman and Mel Ferrer was cute to watch and I wanted to see the inevitable happen between them. However, once the action switched to the home of Ingrid's fiancé, it all completely fell apart. Instead of romance and charm, we see some excruciatingly dopey parallel characters emerge who ruin the film. The fiancé's boorish son and the military attaché's vying for the maid's attention looked stupid--sort of like a subplot from an old Love Boat episode. How the charm and elegance of the first portion of the film can give way to dopiness is beyond me. This film is an obvious attempt by Renoir to recapture the success he had with THE RULES OF THE GAME, as the movie is very similar once the action switches to the country estate (just as in the other film). I was not a huge fan of THE RULES OF THE GAME, but ELENA AND HER MEN had me appreciating the artistry and nuances of the original film.

Jean Renoir once told he wanted to make this movie to see Ingrid Bergman smile to the camera. This is the strength and the limit of Elena et les hommes. Ingrid Bergman smiles, living buoyantly in this colorful political farce. She and every other character involved goes nowhere. Hence the movie can be seen as a light series of social shafts of wit, something Renoir has always been good at showcasing. He delivers this, his nephew delivers a really nice cinematography but on the whole it looks artificial and vain.Not a great movie so, but it's always a pleasure to see Bergman smile.