Albert Topaze (Peter Sellers), a poor but proud French schoolmaster, loses his job after he refuses to alter the failing grades of one of his students. Seizing the opportunity to exploit his honesty, actress Suzy Courtois (Nadia Gray) convinces her lover, the corrupt city council member Castel Benac (Herbert Lom), to hire Topaze as a managing director for one of his shady businesses.
Sellers' lone directorial effort, MR. TOPAZE displays the British comic genius at the peak of his powers alongside his future Pink Panther nemesis Herbert Lom and a stellar supporting cast that includes Leo McKern, Billie Whitelaw and Michael Gough. Long considered a "lost" classic, MR. TOPAZE was digitally restored in 2K from the last surviving 35mm prints held in the BFI National Archive.
In his newly-written MR. TOPAZE essay included in the Film Movement Classics release, Roger Lewis, author of "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers" writes "In my opinion we are only now beginning to wake up to Sellers' unique qualities as a performer, and the rediscovery of Mr. Topaze will aid this reassessment. It is a film of which Jacques Tati might be proud. It is as good as any of the later Chaplin efforts, Limelight or A Countess from Hong Kong. It is a scandal that it was lost for so long."
My Thoughts
Mr. Topaze is a classic film that centers around a French schoolteacher. He takes being an educator seriously and refuses to let students slide if they refuse to put in the work. After he loses his job for refusing to fail a student, an actress and city councilmen hire him as a director for their business. Its seems like a great opportunity at first, but they are using his honest reputations to manipulate him.
This is a fun film filled with humor and nostalgia. Mr. Topaze is a classic character, and the entire cast has a classic Hollywood charm. If you'd like to grab a copy of this classic film for yourself, you can find it in stores nationwide or online at Amazon.
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