A film worth watching for the cinematography alone: Quai des Brumes

We were perhaps the only people in the history of Air France to watch from among the many movie suggestions Marcel (?) Carne's 1938 drama Quai de  Brumes (Port of Shadows), but so we did. Despite the ridiculous viewing conditions w/ a screen in the facing seatback, we could still see that in some ways this is a great movie. The story of a deserter from the Army who seeks refuge and a new identity in the port city of Le Havre is pretty much a straight-out melodrama, but what sets it apart from so many is the fantastic cinematography: Carne shoots much of the picture on location and out of doors, beginning with a foggy night when a truck driver picks up a hitchhiker on the highway shoulder, then many moody b/w scenes of the harbor, the boats at work w/ the crews loading freight, the isolated shacks along the quay - you could pretty much watch it in silence just of the look of the settings. The story is OK, if a little hard to follow at times, and Carne lightens things up a bit with the motif of a stray dog who has attached himself to the protagonist. The air of darkness smothers the plot itself never learn why the soldier (Jean Gabin) deserted, except that he says he's a "wanted man" - he seems to have developed scruples about killing, a problem in the Army, no doubt. On the downside, the romantic subplot is idiotic, but w/ Gain and his love interest, who is supposedly only 17 (!), way way too old for the parts, and fight scenes are without a doubt the worst "stage fights" I have ever seen - worth watching for the comic ineptitude alone. The film is a curiosity at best, but was a fore-runner of other alienated French (and American) anti-heroes; for ex., it's easy to draw the connection between the conclusion of this film and Belmondo dying in Jean Seborg's arms on a bloody Parist street some 20 or so years later.