On a foggy highway, a lonely soldier hitches a ride and ends up in a lonely bar on the outskirts of town, where lost souls gather for a melancholy repast. The soldier is Jean (Jean Gabin), a deserter on the run whose flight is interrupted when he meets sad runaway Nelly (Michele Morgan) and falls in love. He becomes entwined in the troubles of her life, notably the lascivious guardian (Michel Simon) who lusts after Nelly and attempts to blackmail Jean, and a cocky, hot-headed gangster (Pierre Brasseur) who tries to scare Jean off, only to be humiliated in front his men and the town. It's not hard to see where this spiral of threats and confrontations is leading (the title, after all, translates to "Port of Shadows," as ominous a title as any American film noir, especially in a small town where everyone's lives become tightly wound together. Director Marcel Carné and writer Jacques Prévert (who went on to collaborate on the French masterpiece Children of Paradise) infuse the film with a sense of dignity and quiet poetry. At night the port town is like a world in the clouds, cut off from the rest of the world, where all the sordid yearnings and desperate plans of the ambitious players take on a mythic resonance. It's only by light of day that everything returns to its shabby place. A classic of French poetic realism. --Sean AxmakerMore...
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