This one turned out to be a comic fantasy as opposed to a tragi-comedy (though this was perhaps to be expected of Clair); still, it's beautifully done: clever, witty and extremely stylish. The film is certainly among the best adaptations of the Faust legend, but it also essentially lacks a sense of menace that would have made it more 'complete'.
It's interesting in that Michel Simon and Gerard Philipe alternate playing Faust and the Devil; both actors are at the top of their game here, which certainly makes for delightful viewing. Special effects, production design and camera-work all contribute enormously to the film's overall effectiveness - though it seems to have been influenced, to some extent, by Jean Cocteau's LA BELLE ET LA BETE (1946). Its updating/resetting of the story from medieval Germany to (presumably, as this is never actually stated) 19th century France is very capably handled; Clair, in fact, manages to make the famous subject matter all his own (by jettisoning/replacing some elements of the plot) and it certainly compares very favorably indeed with the two major cinematic versions of the folktale - F.W. Murnau's Expressionistic FAUST (1926) and William Dieterle's celebrated Americanization in the form of ALL THAT MONEY CAN BUY aka THE DEVIL AND DANIEL WEBSTER (1941). As a sidenote, one (modernized) variation on the Faustian theme I would definitely love to watch is John Farrow's ALIAS NICK BEAL (1949), which has never been shown on TV on my side of the water!
Really, there is little to criticize here: the Devil may appear to be a bumbling fool most of the time, if a thoroughly amiable one, and the genuinely surprised expression on his face whenever one of his schemes actually works is a joy to behold; his eventual demise - hoist with his own petards - is especially amusing and unexpected, thus allowing Faust (who has effectively thwarted the course of history) to remain young and in the company of his true love. The romantic angle, though, is pretty bland - if quite typical of French cinema at this time; the scenes at court (recitals, extravagant balls and dinners) are certainly lavish but also fairly draggy, distracting one from the various lively street and tavern scenes, sideshow/gypsy caravan subplot, laboratory experiments, gold-digging sequences, etc.
All in all, a genuine treat where you have some of French cinema's finest talents all working in unison to produce an instant classic. Strangely enough, the late Leslie Halliwell (an eminent British film critic) remarked in his critique of LA BEAUTE' DU DIABLE that it is "perhaps not among Clair's greatest works", despite awarding it a highly respectable (for him) three stars; I, for one, would beg to differ!
