La française et l'amour (1960)

User Rating:

5.9/10   

Directors:

Michel Boisrond
Christian-Jaque

Writers:

Michel Audiard (segment)
Marcel Aymé (segment) (story)

Release Date:

23 September 1960 (West Germany)

Genre:

Comedy

Plot Keywords:

Divorce Lawyer | Train | Divorce | Marriage | Anthology

Cast

Jacqueline Porel	...	Mme. Bazouche (segment "Enfance, L'")
Pierre-Jean Vaillard	...	Eugene Bazouche (segment "Enfance, L'")
Darry Cowl	...	Dr. Dufieux (segment "Enfance, L'")
Micheline Dax	...	Lulu (segment "Enfance, L'")
Noël Roquevert	...	Col. Chappe (segment "Enfance, L'")
Paulette Dubost	...	Mme. Tronche (segment "Enfance, L'")
Martine Lambert	...	Gisele Bazouche (segment "Enfance, L'")
Alain Morat	...	Jaja Bazouche (segment "Enfance, L'") (as Bibi Morat)
Jacques Duby	...	Monsieur Victor (segment "Enfance, L'")
Pierre Paulet	...	Driver (segment "Enfance, L'")
Sophie Desmarets	...	Lucienne, Bichette's mother (segment "Adolescence, L'")
Annie Sinigalia	...	Bichette (segment "Adolescence, L'")
Pierre Mondy	...	Edouard, Bichette's father (segment "Adolescence, L'")
Roger Pierre	...	Prince Charming (segment "Adolescence, L'")
Pierre-Louis	...	(segment "Adolescence, L'")

Also Known As:

La francese e l'amore (Italy)
Love and the Frenchwoman (USA)

Runtime:

143 min

Country:

Italy | France

Language:

French

Color:

Black and White

Certification:

Hungary:18 | Finland:K-16

Company:

Paris Elysées Films

Movie Connections:

References North by Northwest (1959)

While none of them were especially great, all the portions of the film were well done

This is an interesting film because like several other European films of the 1960s it's an anthology--directed by several different people. However, unlike many such films, this one actually plays almost like one long story instead of a collection of short films--especially because in a few stories, the characters appear to be the same--just older. Each story is about a different aspect of love--such as curiosity, marriage, infidelity and divorce. They all purport to be about women, though without the men in the film, none of these stories would have worked! Now compared to American films of 1960, this film might have seemed a tad bawdy. After all, it talked about adultery, premarital sex and the like, though a few American films of the day actually were beginning to address these issues as well--just not quite as quickly and directly as this film. Though, even for the supposedly open French, it was cute to see that the French parents, too, struggled with telling their kids the true facts of life. Also, while the film could seem a bit amoral in not openly condemning adultery, the film also seemed to affirm marriage in the cute segment where divorce lawyers and a nosy mother managed to ruin a perfectly good divorce.

Overall, the directing, writing and acting were all very good and I really had a hard time telling that they actually used multiple directors, as they all seemed well integrated into the film and were universally entertaining.