Mothers of France
About Mothers of France
In July 1914 Jeanne d’Urbex lives at the family château with her husband, a retired officer, and their son Robert. She is godmother to Marie Lebroux, whose family farms the estate with their son and the adopted orphan Noret. Père Lebroux and the schoolmaster Guinot are sure another war cannot come. After Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia, the men leave. Jeanne becomes matron of the hospital at Reims. Robert is mortally wounded. She goes toward the lines and reaches him at a first-aid post as he dies, and she takes the letter in his hand asking her to set an example for the mothers of France. Her husband is killed soon after. She stays with the wounded, and at the schoolhouse she writes on the blackboard that France must carry the war on so that mothers will no longer suffer.
Cast & crew
More about Mothers of France
Louis Mercanton and René Hervil directed. Jean Richepin wrote the scenario and also appears. Eclipse produced the film. Les Films Louis Aubert of Paris was the original French distributor. The Cinémathèque française dates the French release 2 February 1917 and lists 74 minutes, 35mm, black and white. The French title is Mères françaises.
Themes
Background
Eclipse released the film on 2 February 1917, two months before the United States entered the war. Bernhardt, then in her seventies, plays a hospital matron who loses her son and her husband.
Music
Silent.
Preservation
The Cinémathèque française describes the surviving material as incomplete, the only fragment known to remain.
Notes
- Sarah Bernhardt plays Madame d’Urbex.
- Jean Angelo plays Robert. Georges Deneubourg plays the commandant. Gabriel Signoret plays Guinot. Berthe Jalabert plays Marie Lebroux. Jean Signoret plays Noret.
- Georges Melchior, Pierre Delmonde, and Doubleau are also on the Cinémathèque cast list.
- James Travers, writing on frenchfilms.org in 2015, places the château at Mercurey in eastern France.
Scenes
- Jeanne finds Robert dying on a cot in a shelled building and takes the letter from his hand.
- She writes on the school blackboard that France must keep fighting so mothers will no longer suffer.
Also available
- Internet Archive (silent-mothers-of-france)
