Renoir is, as always, obsessed with class in this rags-to-riches-to-rags story of a bum that just wants to be a bum and that's all there is to it. Boudu Saved From Drowning is Renoir's first high-profile classic, though I found it a little too absurd. A well-to-do bookseller saves a bum from drowning and takes him under his wing, only to find out the man didn't particularly want to be saved and doesn't particularly have any interest in becoming just like the bookseller. There are a lot of really obvious moments here, like when the bookseller tells his housekeeper/mistress that he has a piano even though no one in the house plays piano because people of his standing are supposed to have a piano. Or when the bookseller realizes that saving Boudu was a mistake and says something along the lines of, "I suppose one should only save someone of their own class." It's all an amusing exercise in social satire, but compared to the alternately complex and outlandish Rules of the Game, the movie is as brutish and obvious as Boudu himself.
There is an appeal here still, a sort of looking-glass version of Capra's films that were being made around the same time. But it's not enough to make this any more than an enjoyable hour and a half. Worth seeing, but beyond that, I fail to see the lasting significance.
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