Classic Movie Review: Love in the Aftermoon (1972)

Love in the Afternoon (1972) 

Directed by: Éric Rohmer.

Written by: Éric Rohmer.

Starring: Bernard Verley (Frédéric), Zouzou (Chloé), Françoise Verley (Hélène), Daniel Ceccaldi (Gérard), Malvina Penne (Fabienne), Elisabeth Ferrier (Martine), Françoise Fabian (Dream Sequence), Marie-Christine Barrault (Dream Sequence), Haydée Politoff (Dream Sequence), Aurora Cornu (Dream Sequence), Laurence de Monaghan (Dream Sequence), Béatrice Romand (Dream Sequence).

 

On a personal level, I would have loved if Eric Rohmer had kept right on making his Moral Tales for his entire career – although I get it, after a decade of telling variations on the same story, he wanted to move onto something else. His last of the Six Moral Tales is Love in the Afternoon (formerly known as Chloe in the Afternoon, a title I prefer, if only because all the other films have the female character’s name or description – in the title) – and its one of his best.

 

His male protagonist here is Frederic (Bernard Verley) – and he’s further along in his life than any of the other males in this series. He’s not just engaged, or in a relationship, or have a crush – he’s actually taken the plunge, gotten married - to Helene (Francoise Verley), his real life wife. They already have a daughter, and another child on the way. And yet, of course, he still struggles with the same desires and feelings as all of Rohmer’s other protagonists. Chloe (Zouzou), an ex-girlfriend of a former friend, appears in his office one afternoon, asking for help – help he really cannot give. And yet the two develop a friendship, a flirtation, and we know where this is leading. Here, Frederic has to make the choice as to whether or not to cheat on his wife. Making a return after basically two films off is the constant voiceover narration of the protagonist, although he seems more interested in describing what is happening, then what precisely his thoughts are.

 

Before we get there though, Rohmer does something he has never done before – he crafts a dream sequence, featuring all the major female actresses from La Collectioneuse, My Night at Maud’s and Claire’s Knee. It is during this sequence where Frederic talks about how he notices women now that he is married. It’s a fascinating sequence, and is Rohmer’s acknowledgement of the films of his past, and his way of wrapping them all up.

 

The film is basically made up of two kinds of sequences – the domestic home life of Frederic and Helene, which marks another slight departure for these films. Normally the woman the protagonist is with disappears from the bulk of the film, or at least during his flirtation with the other woman, but here it’s part of the fabric of the film. The other scenes are of Frederic and Chloe as they do their flirtation dance with each other. Frederic deludes himself into thinking they are just friends – she just needs a job reference, a reference for a landlady, etc. But she has her sights set on him. But as it becomes clear throughout the film, she doesn’t really want to steal him away from Helene – she just wants to have a baby, and wants Frederic to be the father – and then she will raise it alone.

 

In many ways, Love in the Afternoon is more typical than some of Rohmer’s films. It was in fact remade by Chris Rock as I Think I Love My Wife (2007) – which surprisingly followed the film fairly faithfully, just with more jokes. The idea of a man being weighed down by the stresses of domestic life, fantasizing about an affair with a beautiful woman, and having to decide whether it’s worth it, is the stuff of cliché. And yet, Rohmer takes it all extremely seriously, without being preachy, and takes the moral question seriously. The final 15 minutes of the film – his final scene with Chloe, where he makes his decision, and then his final scene with Helene, where he has to deal with the fallout of all of this, is among the best sequences in all of these films.

 

And so now, we are at the end of Rohmer’s Six Moral Tales. They are fascinating, and singular among art house films of its time – six films, telling what in broad outlines is the same story, and finding fascinating variations on a theme throughout. Individually, all the films are very good – with the final three being legitimately great. Taken together, they are a monumental achievement.

Classic Movie Review: Claire's Knee (1970)

Claire's Knee (1970)

Directed by: Éric Rohmer.

Written by: Éric Rohmer.

Starring: Jean-Claude Brialy (Jerome), Aurora Cornu (Aurora, the novelist), Béatrice Romand (Laura), Laurence de Monaghan (Claire), Michèle Montel (Madame Walter), Gérard Falconetti (Gilles), Fabrice Luchini (Vincent).

 

Claire’s Knee is the first of Eric Rohmer’s Six Moral Tales to completely eliminate the voiceover narration that figured heavily in the first three (chronologically) – The Bakery Girl of Monceau, Suzanne’s Career and La Collectionneuse, but was very limited in My Night at Maud’s (it will make a comeback in Chloe in the Afternoon). And yet, in a way, it doesn’t need that voiceover, because essentially the protagonist feels the constant need to explain himself to his friend – Aurora – who sets him on his journey in the film. Like all the Six Moral Tales, the protagonist – here it’s Jerome (Jean-Claude Brialy), a Frenchmen, living abroad, engaged to married a diplomat’s daughter, who returns to his beachside house in France – alone – in order to get it ready for sale – spends most of the movie obsessed with a girl who he isn’t with, but will eventually leave to return to his fiancé. And yet, there are quite a few differences here as well.

 

If you didn’t know the basic plot, you may think the girl he’ll be obsessed with is Aurora (Aurora Cornu) – and in a way, I think he is. Aurora is the more classic Rohmer unknowable woman in the film – smarter, darker, more “difficult” – and the one Jerome actually connects with. But perhaps out of her own perverse joy, she challenges Jerome to do something else – essentially to flirt with the two teenage daughters of her landlady. In the first part of the film, Jerome develops a friendship with Laura (Beatrice Romand_ - all of about 16 – who is open to the attention of this middle-aged man, and flirts back. Later, Jerome will move onto Laura’s older half-sister Claire (Laurence de Monaghan), a blonde, skinny, attractive, often clad in a bikini and with her boyfriend Gilles (Gerard Falconetti). And Jerome becomes obsessed with the idea of touching Claire’s knee – which he discovers when he watches her climb and ladder – and then he conspires to find a way to touch it himself.

 

I cannot help but wonder what the reaction to the film would be today – if it would just be dismissed as another dirty old man obsessed with teenage girls film – a French Woody Allen film as it were, and to be honest, it probably would. But that’s not really what Rohmer has made here. There is a long conversation fairly late in the film between Jerome and Aurora, where Jerome justifies everything he has done – the flirting with a 16-year-old, his desire to touch Claire’s knee, as being something that his “character” wants – essentially turning the tables back on Aurora, who dared him to do in the first place. Therefore, everything he has done, and is trying to do, is just him playing a role. He insists – much like all male Rohmer characters in these films, that even if Claire tried to seduce him, he would reject her. He has no desire for her – but, you see, his character does. He does hate Gilles however – saying that he’s boorish and beneath Claire – and that she should get away from him as quickly as possible. He uses this – and what he sees from his boat – in a scene late in the film to try and break Claire done – get her emotional, so that he can touch that knee – surely in a consoling manner – and get her to break up with Gilles. He leaves the film triumphant – believing he has accomplished his goal, but Rohmer sneakily adds a scene right at the end that completely undermines his “victory”.

 

All of Rohmer’s male protagonists in these movies are deluded in some way – Jerome more than most. He talks about how physical attractiveness doesn’t much matter to him – it’s the character of the person that matters. This is something they say, but is demonstrably false. Rohmer men always choose the safe option, over the more complicated one in the women they end up with. We see this play out in a number of ways in Claire’s Knee – the overall arc being the same, as the others, but with differences as well. Because, of course, Laura is the smarter of the two teenagers – the one who actually does fall for Jerome, but is also smart enough to know that it is merely a passing crush, and although the feelings are acute, they will not last. She and Jerome can have long talks with each other, and engage in the way Jerome says he likes. But then he runs to Claire – because of that damn knee. Claire is a kind of empty character by design – there doesn’t seem to be much going on with her, she is content to play volleyball, lounge on the beach, and be with Gilles. Yet, perhaps, that’s just because she has no real interest in Jerome – in anyway. She isn’t interested in talking to him, and doesn’t particularly care what his opinion on anything is. He’s just some guy – an acquaintance of the “tenant” – and she doesn’t give him a thought. That, of course, makes him obsess about her even more.

 

Claire’s Knee is probably the best of the Six Moral Tales – although I think saying that is a distinction without much of a difference. It is the most beautiful film – shot by the brilliant cinematographer Nestor Almendros, who died too young of AIDS, but did some of the best work anyone has ever done in the field (Malick’s Days of Heaven – although he worked often with Rohmer and Francois Truffaut as well Barbet Schreoder, Maurice Pialat, Monte Hellman, Jean Eustache and Martin Scorsese). Claire’s Knee contains some of his best work – the beautiful scenery, and the way he captures Jerome’s voyeurism.

 

It is also, I think, the most complex of the movies – the one that leaves you with the most questions, some of them perhaps accidental. The other women in the Six Moral Tales all seem to be willing participants in the games the men are playing. As insipid as Claire seems to be, there is no sense that she is here – she is pawn, being used by two older people, and doesn’t even know it. It’s telling that Rohmer ends the film on her, not Jerome. Yes, he is doing it to undermine his victory – even if he doesn’t know it. But it’s more than that as well. It shows just what she’ll go onto become. It’s not happy – even if it has little to nothing to do with Jerome.

Classic Movie Review: La Collectioneuse (1967)

La Collectionneuse (1967)

Directed by: Éric Rohmer.

Written by: Patrick Bauchau and Haydée Politoff and Daniel Pommereulle and Éric Rohmer.

Starring: Patrick Bauchau (Adrien), Haydée Politoff (Haydée), Daniel Pommereulle (Daniel), Alain Jouffroy (Writer), Mijanou Bardot (Carole), Annik Morice (Carole's girlfriend), Dennis Berry (Charlie).

 

La Collectionneuse was the first feature in Eric Rohmer’s Six Moral Tales – following shorts The Bakery Girl of Manceau and Suzanne’s Career both made in 1963, although it is referred to by Rohmer as the fourth in the series, after My Night at Maud’s made two years later (why? I have no idea – you’d have to ask him, perhaps it’s because the “first” three are in black and white, and the final three in color). It follows a pattern that is well known by now – if you’ve seen the films, or been following along in my series of reviews on them. Once again, it focuses on a man – in this case, Adrien (Patrick Bachau), an art dealer who wants to open a gallery, who is involved with Carole (Mijanou Bardot) – who will be spending July in London. She invites him along, but he doesn’t want to go – he has plans to lounge around a beach house on the French Rivera for a month, and doing as little as possible. As is always the case in these Six Moral Tales, the girl our “hero” is involved with at the beginning, will essentially disappear for most of the narrative – replaced by a different girl who he will be drawn to, and talk endlessly to and about – mostly involving sex, without ever having sex with them – and then returning to the safety of the relationship we saw at the beginning. The outline is the same, the specifics are different.

 

Adrien narrates the movie – almost as incessantly as the male protagonists of The Bakery Girl of Monceau and Suzanne’s Career do. The entire movie is his point of view, and he narrates all the action. He arrives at the beach house, where his friend Daniel (Daniel Pommereulle) is already staying – Adrien would prefer to be alone, but Daniel is okay. What he is less happy about is that the owner of the house has also allowed a young woman – Haydee (Haydee Politoff) to stay there as well. The men are about 30, Haydee is 20 – and is about the only thing the two men talk about, despite the fact they both claim to have no interest in her. She leaves the house nearly every night – jumping into a different car, with a different young man every night, and coming home the next morning, sometimes in the same car with the same boy, sometimes not. The two men cruelly refer to her as a “Collector” – in this case, of men. They assume she sleeps with all these men, and will eventually set their sights on one or both of them. Adrien doesn’t want the “distraction” of Haydee, and tries to maneuver Haydee and Daniel together. Daniel tries a counter offensive, but none too effectively.

 

Because the narration, we know everything that Adrien is thinking throughout La Collectionneuse – or at least what he says he is thinking. Because, no matter how much he says he wishes Haydee would go away, he finds it impossible to ignore her – impossible to just leave her alone and go about his nothing. We don’t know what Daniel is thinking – but we get the impression he isn’t thinking much. He doesn’t do anything more than sit around, drink and smoke – and he doesn’t have much to say. Haydee is the fascinating one – and like most Rohmer women in these movies, she is unknowable. She keeps her cards close to her vest. She plays along with Adrien and his games – even going along when he essentially offers her to older man, a collector of a different sort. But there, like in other situations, she doesn’t do precisely what you expect.

 

La Collectionneuse is a film that is dripping with sensuality, and yet contains only the briefest shot of sex – early in the film. Like the other films, there is a lot of talk about sex, around sex, but not much actual sex. These are apparently moral tales, but just what the moral is, and whether it actually is moral, is not always clear. Here, it seems like Adrien enjoys playing the games he is playing with Daniel – and especially Haydee – throughout. But at some point, the game isn’t fun anymore – perhaps he senses he has lost it, and doesn’t quite understand how. And so, he will leave the French Rivera, and return to his old, safer life – leaving behind this complicated, unknowable girl behind. But he won’t forget her.  

Classic Movie Review: My Night at Maud's (1969)

My Night at Maud's (1969)

Directed by: Éric Rohmer   

Written by:  Éric Rohmer.

Starring: Jean-Louis Trintignant (Jean-Louis), Françoise Fabian (Maud), Marie-Christine Barrault (Françoise), Antoine Vitez (Vidal).

 

If you know anything about My Night at Maud’s, Eric Rohmer’s 1969 masterpiece, it’s that it’s about a man and woman spending a long night together talking about the sex they both want to have with each other, but are pointedly not having. That is the basic description of the movie that most give- and so when you watch the film, it’s kind of strange that it takes a good 30 minutes before the night in question begins, and the night is over maybe 40 minutes later, leaving a good 45 minutes left in the movie. The title though is still accurate though, because while the night is only about a third of the film, it hangs over the rest of the film, right until the final scene, which makes clear everything that has happened since the main events of the film. It’s a bittersweet ending to a bittersweet film.

 

The film stars Jean-Louis Trintignant as Jean-Louis, a French Catholic, who has returned to France after some time away. He’s in his mid-30s, and early in the film his eye catches that of Francoise (Marie-Christine Barrault), a younger, blonde student at Church – and really wants to meet. Her – which, of course, he will eventually do. He also runs into an old friend – Vidal (Antoine Vitez) – and the two begin talking. Eventually, Vidal will introduce Jean-Louis to the title character – Maud (Francoise Fabian) – a woman who is about the same age as Jean-Louis (perhaps a year or two older), recently divorced, with a child already. The trio of them will end up at Maud’s apartment – where Vidal will eventually flee in a huff, after it becomes clear there is a connection between Jean-Louis and Maud. The two will then have the long talk that some seem to think the entire film is – a talk about love and sex and religion. The two of them don’t agree on much – but they push and pull each other in interesting ways – challenge each other.

 

That scene really is one of the best extended sequences in movie history. It is a masterpiece of writing of directing, or acting – both verbal and physical. Rohmer lets his camera run on and on, making the actors have to act in a kind of choreography. Their body language is very subtle – and actors read each other body language, and react accordingly. There is a subtle push and pull here – sometimes she seems to be drawing him closer – she spends most of the time on her bed and other times, she subtly pushes him back. The same is true of him as well. The film allows both of these people to have their ideas, and allows them to express those ideas to each other, in ways that at times contradict themselves, and certainly puts them at odds with each other.

 

And then, of course, the night ends. This connection the two of them share lasts into the next day, the next couple of days, but not much longer. She is going to be leaving town soon, and may not be coming back. He actually meets Francoise, and the two of them develop a connection as well. Yet, it’s impossible to not watch the first night Jean-Louis and Francoise together and compare and contrast it with the long night he spends with Maud. The two talk and flirt a little, but they also retreat to their own rooms fairly early. They have a connection – and its built on something shared though – their Catholicism – and perhaps their shame at their own sexual past. It’s a more comfortable connection, less challenging for Jean-Louis, where he gets to the be the older, wiser one – the comforting one, who gets to “forgive” her for her transgressions. And soon, while he never forgets Maud, he lets her drift away.

 

My Night at Maud’s may well be the apex of Rohmer’s films in this vein. Again, as mentioned in my other reviews of the earlier films in the series, Rohmer described them as boy meets girl, spends most of the movie with another girl, and then returns to the first girl again. It’s also clear that the girl the man eventually settles with is young, less challenging, usually blonde, where the girl he chooses to leave behind is darker, more challenging, more intelligent – perhaps more difficult. The connection may be more intense, but more intense may not be what they want.

 

The final scene in the movie flashes forward five years, and brings everyone together once again to let you see where everyone is, and how deep those connections go. It’s a bittersweet ending – it gives us more information about Francoise – but basically because we see the roads not taken. It’s not that Jean-Louis isn’t happy in the end – but he has certainly settled into a safer, more contented life. And he’ll never know what might have been. You get the sense that years from now, he’ll still remember that night at Maud’s.

Classic Movie Review: Suzanne's Career (1963)

Suzanne's Career (1963)

Directed by: Éric Rohmer.

Written by: Éric Rohmer.

Starring: Catherine Sée (Suzanne), Philippe Beuzen (Bertrand), Christian Charrière (Guillaume), Diane Wilkinson (Sophie), Patrick Bauchau (Frank), Jean-Claude Biette (Jean-Louis).

 

The second of Eric Rohmer’s six moral tales – another short, but this one 53 minutes long, instead of the 23 minutes of The Bakery Girl of Monceau is ever so slightly different from the others in this series. Rohmer has described the films as Boy wants one girl, spends most of the movie with another girl, and then returns to the first girl – which is a pretty good summary of all the films, with the exception of Suzanne’s Career, which is ever so slightly different. Here, the man at the center of the film is Bertrand (Phillippe), a student whose best friend is Guillaume (Christian Charriere). Guillaume has an easy way with women – he is able to seduce them rather easily – and discards them almost as easily. In Suzanne’s Career, the girl Guillaume seduces and then abandons – cruelly – is Suzanne, a student and worker herself. It’s not a coincidence that she is working class (like The Bakery Girl of Monceau), with short dark hair (ditto) – or that her tormentors are more upper class. What is different here though is that it’s from the point-of-view of Bertrand, not Guillaume. Bertrand has a relationship – of sorts – with Suzanne, but not in the same way. And the whole thing ends different as well. And yet, it’s still very much in the vein of the rest of the moral tales of Rohmer – in terms of style and the personality of those involved.

 

Bertrand thinks very highly of himself – he looks down on those around him, on Guillaume, for the way he abuses people, at Suzanne for the way she allows herself to be used. We hear everything from Bertrand’s point-of-view throughout – like the young man in The Bakery Girl on Monceau, he provides a near constant narration, unless there’s dialogue being spoken. He fancies himself a serious student (he’s studying pharmaceuticals). He has a crush on the beautiful Sophie (Diane Wilkinson) – although, of course, he barely has enough courage to speak to her at all, let alone ask her out. Suzanne enters his life when he’s at a coffee shop with Guillaume, and he basically picks her up right there – inviting her to his house for a dinner party later than week. At that dinner party, she plays hostess, while Guillaume basically ignores her – but then uses Bertrand as a screen to keep her at his place overnight. Bertrand is disgusted by the whole display – and while you could describe this as slut shaming before the term was invented, he seems to be equally as disgusted with both Guillaume and Suzanne. And yet, of course, he continues to see them both. Even after Guillaume pretty much dumps Suzanne, Bertrand continues to see her – even going along with Guillaume’s cruel plan to basically bankrupt her.

 

Suzanne is given more screen time, more dialogue, more agency than the title character of the bakery girl at Monceau, although she is still basically a victim here. A victim of Guillaume in the way he treats her, the way he exploits her – but also of Bertrand, for the way he looks down on her. She is, in this telling anyway, because we are always aware that the point-of-view we are seeing in Bertrand’s, so perhaps not the truth, she is basically a doormat for these young men. And yet, Rohmer provides her with a moment of triumph at the end that he didn’t allow the bakery girl. After some money goes missing from Bertrand (we never find out if it was Guillaume or Suzanne who took it – but I bet most people will come away thinking Guillaume) – she disappears from the narrative, only to return at the end, happy and married to the wealthy Frank. This leaves Bertrand, who was never able to admit his own feelings for her, at a loss for words, and hurt. It also leads him to be truthful with the audience for the first time really – admitting he’s flunking his classes, and about to lose Sophie. Suzanne’s triumph appears complete.

 

But is it? It’s hard to say because she remains the unknowable woman that Rohmer often had in these moral tales. What we do know though is that she has left her job by this point, and who knows about her school. Why is the film called Suzanne’s Career anyway – is her career by the end just going to be wife to the wealthy Frank – who may well be just another version of Guillaume, but now she’s stuck with me because they’re married? And as for Bertrand, he is different from the narrator in the first film – who is more like Guillaume. Bertrand is envious of both Guillaume and Suzanne – that envy turning into disgust with both of them, and eventually turning on himself. He’s too weak willed to ever say anything about it, of course, which is what leads him to his predicament at the end.

 

In many ways, along with The Bakery Girl at Monceau, Suzanne’s career is a dry run for the rest of the movies in the series – all of which are features, and not shorts like these were. It is Rohmer experimenting with style – a kind of accidental realism as he shoots on the streets of Paris, and with narration, etc. It’s amazing, because they end up being pretty much fully formed films – as much as shorts can be – showing just where Rohmer was going. And satisfying in their own way as well.

Classic Movie Review: The Bakery Girl of Monceau (1963)

The Bakery Girl of Monceau (1963)

Directed by: Eric Rohmer.

Written by: Eric Rohmer.

Starring: Barbet Schroeder (Young Man/Narrator), Claudine Soubrier (Jacqueline), Michele Giardon (Sylvie), Fred Junk (Schmidt).

 

The first of Eric Rohmer’s so called Six Moral Tales films – the most celebrated of his career – The Bakery Girl of Monceau is a 23 minute short, that is basically the perfect encapsulation of what Rohmer would go onto do with the other films – just in a much shorter period of time, and a much simpler narrative. Still, the ideas and themes here feel fully formed. Already, he is making us identify with a wealthy, privileged male character, who behaves somewhat cruelly towards others. The style is also fully formed – his use of amusing, ironic voiceovers, etc. As a dry run for what was to come next, The Bakery Girl of Monceau is wonderful. And it works on its own terms as well. While it isn’t Rohmer’s first film – it’s the one that showed just what he was capable of.

 

The film stars future director Barbet Schroeder as a Young Man – a law student – who becomes enchanted with Sylvie – a beautiful, sophisticated blonde woman he literally bumps into on the street. He arranges his usual walks to bump into her, and then eventually asks her out. She says she is busy that night, but another time – they’re sure to bump into each other again. So it’s clear that she’s noticed him as well.

 

But then, Sophie is seemingly gone. He walks around the neighborhood day after day looking for her, hoping to bump into her, but never does. He starts going to a local bakery and buying cookies for his walk. He starts flirting with the young baking assistant – Jacqueline – behind the counter there. She is everything that Sylvie is not – she is shorter, plumper, has short, dark hair. She is also younger, and clearly less sophisticated – especially to the young man, who tells usR in voiceover “What offended me is not that she liked me, but that she thought I may like her back”. He clearly sees himself as above her. And yet, he keeps going back to that bakery, keeps flirting with her. Even talks her into a date – even though she knows she’ll get in trouble for it. And then, of course, Sylvie reappears right before the date.

 

By the time Rohmer made The Bakery Girl of Monceau, he was already in his 40s – he was older than the other filmmakers in the French New Wave by a decade so perhaps that gave him slightly more insight into characters like the young man here. That he is cruel to the Bakery Girl is undeniable – he basically bats her around like a plaything, and then discards her. Rohmer explained his moral tales as films in which a man falls for one woman, gets obsessed with another until the first reappears, and that is this whole film in a nutshell. Rohmer is extremely interested in the young man here – we hear his thoughts throughout the film, and hence everything he is thinking. The two women in the film are, like most Rohmer women, unknowable because the characters narrating don’t understand them. We learn that Sylvie lived across the street from the bakery the whole time – and saw the Young Man on his daily rounds (she wasn’t around because a broken leg confined her to the apartment). We don’t know if she knows what he has been doing with the Bakery Girl – and if so, if she thought it was cruel, or funny, or something in between. Likewise, we have no idea what the Bakery Girl’s reaction to being left was. The Young Man leaves her behind without a thought (at least once he got off that street unseen).

 

In total, The Bakery Girl of Monceau is probably more lightweight than the other films in the series – a symptom of being just 23 minutes long more than anything. But it’s very much in line with what he would go onto do – a film about privileged young man, who tells us what he’s thinking in great detail as he’s thinking it, and still opting for the safer, blander choice. Rohmer doesn’t critique the Young Man the way he would his other heroes as the series progresses - he doesn’t have the time really, but that criticism is implied. This is a perfect little encapsulation of what made Rohmer a special filmmaker.