Nana

Jean Renoir's lavish adaptation of Émile Zola's novel about a Parisian courtesan whose beauty and appetite for luxury destroy every man who falls under her spell. Catherine Hessling — Renoir's wife and muse — plays the title character with a feverish, almost cartoonish intensity that divides audiences to this day: her exaggerated performance is either brilliantly stylized or wildly over-the-top, depending on your tolerance for silent-era expressiveness. What's beyond debate is the visual splendor of Renoir's production: the sets, costumes, and compositions are gorgeous, drawing on his painter father's Impressionist palette to create a vision of Second Empire Paris that is sensuous and decadent in equal measure. An early, ambitious work from the director who would become France's greatest filmmaker.