À Propos De Nice on AllMovie

A Propos de Nice was the first of pantheon French filmmaker Jean Vigo's four feature films. According to Vigo's legions of admirers, the film represents Life as the director truly perceived it: Not the steadily flowing river that many assume Life to be, but a dizzying succession of vaguely related, seconds-lasting vignettes. Essentially a satiric documentary of Nice, where the tubercular Vigo had been compelled to settle for his health, the film resembles the montage-like "visual symphonies" of Russian director Dziga Vertov. Indeed, Vertov's brother, Boris Kaufmann, served as cinematographer on this and two subsequent Vigo productions. The delicate blend between realism and surrealism in A Propos de Nice would later be melded with Vigo's sense of poetry in his future masterpieces Zero de conduite and L'Atalante.