One of a rare few noirs featuring extended underwater scenes, Edmond T. Gréville’s Port du désir (US: House on the Waterfront) fascinates in part through its juxtaposition of divers’ undersea isolation with the frenetic socialization of a brothel (the prostitution is portrayed explicitly) posing as a clip joint on the sleazy docks of Marseille. Captain Lequévic (Jean Gabin) has been ordered to refloat a sunken ship which is thought to have belonged to smugglers, so he recruits diver Michel (Henri Vidal) to assist with the task; the captain is unaware that Michel is also in talks with the smugglers about exploding the ship which contains not only smuggled goods, but the corpse of a murdered whore from the brothel whose sister Martine (Andrée Debar) has arrived in town looking for her and has quickly stolen Michel’s heart. Gabin by now had entered the paternalistic phase of his career, mentoring younger criminals and younger lovers, and here he has earned the respect of all the denizens of the brothel from his private room on the second floor. The scenes of dancing in the brothel are brilliantly staged (Edith Georges, who plays the joint’s main attraction, Lola, can shake her rear end like nobody else), and the lovemaking between Michel and Martine is impressively authentic. The film isn’t particularly nocturnal for a noir; in fact, the diving scenes, which are accompanied by a particularly beautiful orchestral score, may be the darkest in the film.