French Love Stories
From just before World War II until the dawn of the "New Wave", here is a small group of enjoyable, curious, sometimes unexpected black & white films with many of the major stars of the period.
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Julietta
Directed by Marc Allégret • Drama • With Jean Marais, Dany Robin, Jeanne Moreau • 1953 • 97 minutes
JULIETTA is a romantic comedy with the whimsical energy of a hummingbird. Dany Robin stars as the eponymous demoiselle, a flighty, impulsive pixie in white gloves who is engaged to an older prince...
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School for Love (w/ Brigitte Bardot)
Directed by Marc Allégret • Drama • With Jean Marais, Brigitte Bardot, Isabelle Pia, Yves Robert • 1955 • 96 minutes
Brigitte Bardot was only 20 when she starred in this adaptation of a 1920 Vicki Baum novel. She’s Sophie, one of a platoon of young music conservatory students in postwar Vienna, ...
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Movie + 1 extraOlivia
Movie + 1 extra
OLIVIA is a remarkable work by one of France’s first ground-breaking female filmmakers, which easily merits rediscovery today after being neglected for almost 70 years.
Plunging the viewer—and the main character—into a true lion’s den, Jacqueline Audry (1908-1977) depicts a 19th century boardin...
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Lady Chatterley's Lover
Directed by Marc Allégret • Drama • With Danielle Darrieux, Leo Genn, Erno Crisa, Jean Murat • 1955 • 100 minutes
This is the first film of D.H. Lawrence’s controversial novel, which premiered in 1955, five years before the uncensored novel even appeared in print in the UK. Danielle Darrieux (in...
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A Game for Six Lovers (L’eau à la bouche)
Directed by Jacques Doniol-Valcroze • Drama • With Bernadette Lafont, Françoise Brion • 1960 • 84 minutes
One of the founders of the epochal film magazine Cahiers du cinema, and therefore a prime mover of the French New Wave, Doniol-Valcroze joined all the upstart critics making films in the lat...
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Fric-Frac
Directed by Maurice Lehmann • Drama • With Fernandel, Michel Simon, Arletty, Hélène Robert • 1939 • 106 minutes
Fernandel was a 20th-century French phenomenon – once he emerged from supporting roles in the early ‘30s, with his inimitable equine mug, enormous incisors and friendly eyes, he comman...
