Le Baron Fantôme

A film to delight those with a taste for the slightly rarefied pleasures of a French Gothic-pastoral plot featuring a vanishing nobleman (played by Cocteau, who also served as dialogue-writer), a tumbledown castle, hidden treasure, two pairs of sparkling lovers, a gamekeeper posing as the Dauphin... and much, much more. Making light of the distinction between fantasy and reality, the kaleidoscopic tale weaves through the gradations of French society in the 1830s. Distinguished by several impeccable classical performances, Dior costumes, ravishing filtered photography and a tone of benign whimsicality, this represents the cinema of fantasy as its best and most compelling.