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Film: My Night With Maud
Release date: 11th October 2010
Certificate: PG
Running time: 105 mins
Director: Eric Rohmer
Starring: Jean-Louis Trintignant, Françoise Fabian, Marie-Christine Barrault, Antoine Vitez, Léonide Kogan
Genre: Drama
Studio: Artificial Eye
Format: DVD
Country: France
My Night With Maud is the third of Eric Rohmer’s ‘six moral tales’, a series of films which all revolve around the same concept – a man who is drawn or dedicated to one woman, but over the course of the film meets another woman who acts as a temptation which he eventually is able to resist. Released in 1969, My Night With Maud is a New Wave showcase of intellectual contemplations projected in a most charming manner.
We follow our Catholic protagonist Jean-Louis around the city of Claremont-Ferond, a picturesque town just north of Paris.
Having established his aspirations for the future, Jean-Louis is convinced that his fate is to marry an attractive young blonde girl who he notices at mass. He then bumps into Vidal, a Marxist school-friend that he hasn’t seen for years, who takes him round to Maud’s for an evening of dinner and thoughtful debate. Jean-Louis engages in a succession of philosophical conversations with Vidal and free-spirited temptress Maud, causing him to query his religious nature, and the likelihood of marriage with the blonde girl. Maud later convinces Jean-Louis to stay the night due to the weather conditions, where there are definite hints of seduction. The film revolves around these conversations between Jean-Louis and friends, covering the usual – sex, religion, philosophy – and then shifting the plot slightly into the territory of ‘story’ as we witness the subsequent steps in Jean-Louis’ life.
Jean-Louis follows the concept of the moral tales, consequently hooking up with the blonde girl from church and leaving Maud to become nothing more than part of his past. Enter Francoise: future wife. There are elements of romance intertwined with this intellectual production, and yet nothing is overtly passionate about My Night At Maud’s. Jean-Louis marries his destiny, but not without a hint of foreboding – Maud re-enters at the end of the film during Jean-Louis and Francoise’s fifth year of marriage, which results in a cleverly implied revelation about Jean-Louis’ seemingly innocent wife…
My Night At Maud’s makes use of the French New Wave style, with hand-held cameras and a plot that grazes upon issues of importance without actually becoming bitter. It is incredibly realistic to be in the driver’s seat of Jean-Louis’ car; the camera allowing the viewer to bump along the tarmac and change gears, watch the houses pass beside the road and beep the horn. We see everything as if it is real life, nothing is omitted in order to produce a slick and idealistic narrative. My Night At Maud’s is undeniably stylish, shot in black-and-white and with its own personal rules of cinematography that allow us to be drawn into the footsteps and heartbeat of Jean-Louis.
Rohmer distracts us with his compelling discussions, whilst simultaneously investigating basic human behaviour without making his explorations apparent. Jean-Louis’ night with Maud tiptoes about rules of attraction, with the entire evening playing out like a non-fictional scenario – their body language and interactions are developed over the course of the evening; we are shown the entirety of their time together, and so we understand how each character’s emotions are shaped.
Jean-Louis Trintignant is undeniably ideal as Jean-Louis, somehow making scripted speech seem natural. His on-screen chemistry with Francoise Fabian as Maud is markedly exquisite - as she chain-smokes and prances around in a short sailor’s shirt, we can feel some unspoken emotion begin to flourish. There is a well articulated difference between Fabian and Marie-Christine Barrault who plays the blonde Francoise; Fabian’s dark features contrast strikingly with Barrault’s fairness on a physical level, but then the two females are equally distinct in their individual personas. While Fabian perfectly exhibits a sultry thinker, Barrault is able to flawlessly play the card of charming naivety.
Rohmer has produced an understated masterpiece, skilfully using references to Pascal’s wager to facilitate the questioning of life which underpins the entire dialogue. It is rare that a director is talented enough to execute an engaging script which is essentially without direction and yet which foregrounds the whole film. We watch the characters in conversation for the majority of the 110 minutes, but the entire scenario is accomplished in an outstandingly convincing fashion thanks to a combination of high quality writing and effortlessly believable acting.
My Night With Maud is like watching your own friends converse for an hour; it is not always the most captivating subject matter but you are happy to watch, boredom is out of the question because you are part of the scene, too. NM
Film: Eric Rohmer: Six Moral Tales
Release date: 12th July 2010
Certificate: 15
Running time: 480 mins
Director: Eric Rohmer
Starring: Jean-Louis Trintignant, Beatrice Romand, Jean-Claude Brialy
Genre: Romance/Drama/Comedy
Studio: Artificial Eye
Format: DVD
Country: France
Originally released over a nine year period from 1963 to 1972, Eric Rohmer’s Six Moral Tales can be considered the world’s first ‘relationship comedies’; in Rohmer’s hands, a genre unto itself, and as far removed from the rom com as can be imagined.
The Girl At The Monceau Bakery (1963)
A student roams the streets of Paris in search of a beautiful young blonde he has grown infatuated with. When she mysteriously goes missing, he begins a flirtation with a girl who works in a bakery. Following the blonde’s reappearance, the student must make a choice after arranging dates on the same day with both girls.
Suzanne’s Career (1963)
A young student named Bertrand is friends with Guillaume, a womaniser whom he seems to both despise and admire. When Gauillaume takes up with the seemingly naïve Suzanne, his poor treatment of the girl leads to tension within the trio.
La Collectioneuse (1967)
Adrien is an art dealer who takes a vacation at a friend's summer house alongside his artist friend Daniel and a mysterious, promiscuous girl named Haydee. Adrien becomes increasingly infatuated and frustrated by the girl’s mixture of inscrutability and apparent availability.
My Night At Maud’s (1969)
A Catholic engineer named Jean-Louis believes he has found his perfect woman one day in church. When a philosopher friend introduces him to Maud, a beautiful divorcee, the engineer ends up spending the night at her apartment after it begins to snow. His growing attraction to Maud threatens to overthrow all his assumptions about love, marriage and morality.
Claire’s Knee (1970)
While on vacation, a diplomat named Jerome is encouraged by his female writer friend to begin a flirtation with a precocious 16-year-old. Although engaged to be married, Jerome engages in a brief flirtation with Laura before moving on to her older sister Claire, culminating in a strange desire to touch her knee.
Love In The Afternoon (1972)
Frederic is a successful businessman, married with one child and another on the way. When an impulsive friend from his past named Chloe comes back into his life, their initial friendship begins to grow into something much more troubling to Frederic’s conscience...
Rohmer always occupied a singular space within the Nouvelle Vague movement with which he is chiefly associated. Significantly older than many of his peers (he did not have a major success until his fifties), many critics viewed him as self-indulgently introspective, and out of touch with the political urgency of contemporary French cinema. Further misgivings arose from the suspicion Rohmer had turned to cinema only after failing to gain much success as a writer.
Ironically, it is the very tendencies his detractors accused him of (introspection, the personal over the political, literariness…) that account for much of the strength of Rohmer’s cinema. Through their focus on a particular type of self-deluding male egoism, the films present the unfurling of thought as their main spectacle, comparing favourably in this respect to the great literature of Goethe or Proust. With their layers of suggestive narrative, intentionally slow pacing and complex characters, they admittedly demand as much from those who see them as they actually give back. Part of the joy of Six Moral Tales, though, is the way in which aspects and themes emerge in your mind for days after having watched them. A great deal of Rohmer’s genius lies in his ability to lead us in a number of directions without our ever feeling as though we are being manipulated – no music tells us what to feel, and what little symbolism is employed always seamlessly incorporated within the story.
In terms of obvious visual spectacle, the Six Moral Tales may initially come as something of a disappointment. Some picturesque alpine and seaside imagery in Claire’s Knee and La Collectioneuse, some evocative shots of Paris in most of the other films, and that may seem to be about it. The first two films in the set feature some of these stylistic tropes typically associated with the Nouvelle Vague (16 mm film, tracking shots of a character’s footsteps, etc.), and the effect is curiously to make them more conventional, even generic. It was only when Rohmer began his fruitful collaboration with Nestor Almendros that the films attained that distinctly Rohmer-esque originality. The level of beauty Almendros displays in his landscapes (particularly in La Collectioneuse, almost Impressionist-like in its use of Cote d’Azur colours) attests to the selfless discipline he brought to the overall collaboration. Incredibly subtle in its effects, it is an exquisitely precise cinematography, especially adept at capturing the nuanced minutiae of glances and gestures that are integral to illuminating the abstract ideas and complex inner emotions of Rohmer’s cinema.
It is the attention to character and the strength of dialogue that really stands out. What strikes you as most remarkable is being able to listen to people talk about love for 480 minutes without them ever resorting to the clichéd, tired or trite. The acting throughout is of a consistently high standard, and Rohmer often asks much of his cast in the many long, uninterrupted dialogue-heavy scenes. Initially, the performances in the earlier films seem somewhat awkward and mannered (particularly in comparison to the later works), but they are thrown into a different light when you realise they are, in fact, performances within performances – almost everyone is playing a role, one they present both to the outside world and to themselves. As the series progresses and the characters become slightly older, these performances become more complex and ingrained, the protagonists clasping more tightly to the masks that seem to wear them as much as they do them.
There is a telling exchange in Claire’s Knee when the writer informs Jerome there are no ingénues anymore. It is, in fact, the young, the seemingly naïve, who are often presented as being the most perceptive. Often female, they have not yet constructed those psychological walls and seem more able to see through the poses the males have. When Suzanne is married at the end of Suzanne’s Career, Bertrand comes to the realisation that he and Gauillaume were children, that she has beaten them “to the finish line.” In Claire’s Knee, the eponymous teenager is closer to the truth than Jerome can admit when she says he doesn’t like her boyfriend because he refuses to bow down to him. The younger precocious sister from that film actually reappears in Love In The Afternoon during Frederic’s daydream in which he fantasises about a charmed amulet that allows him to control the will of all the women in Paris; she is the only one resistant to its powers. It would be misleading to view all Rohmer’s women in this way, however. In many ways, they are often equally self-deluded, just as flawed as the male characters; only the focus in these films is on a specifically male psyche.
Most of the moral tales achieve their effect through a conflict between the protagonist’s words (his own, usually limited or faulty, understanding of his intentions and desires) and his actions. The student justifies his selfish decision to stand up the bakery girl after the blonde reappears as a ‘moral’ choice. Adrien believes he has a moral victory when he abandons Haydee, despite her never being all that responsive to his advances. That Rohmer often allows his male protagonists to maintain their illusions through the ironic manner in which the films usually resolve accounts for much of the subtle comedy of the Six Moral Tales.
Such conflict is given its most extreme manifestation in the strange mix of Les Liasions Dangereuses meets Lolita that is Claire’s Knee. Despite some initial misgivings, Jerome takes to the writer’s challenge with a little more enthusiasm than seems necessary. There are definite shades of Humbert Humbert in his waxing lyrical over his preference for the svelte body-type of Claire, and the scene in which he kisses the younger girl is quite uncomfortable viewing (although mentally very mature, she does appear physically much younger than her stated sixteen years). As Jerome continually attempts to rationalise his increasing obsession, the symbol of Claire’s knee and his desire to caress it gives us something by which to measure the diplomat’s drift from reason.
Perhaps the most conventionally satisfying films are those in which some sort of understanding is reached, even if it is a compromised one. In an epilogue of My Night At Maud’s, the now happily married engineer comes to suspect the wife he was first drawn to for some idealised purity may actually have more to hide from revelations with his night with Maud than he. Realising the jeopardy such suspicions could lead to, or even their meaningless in relation to the lives both now lead; he makes the decision to instantly put it from his mind. In Love In The Afternoon, Frederic and his wife come to realise the detachment they believed essential to their marriage has actually been detrimental to them both. The closing scene in which the couple tearfully embrace is the closest Rohmer comes to emotional catharsis in these films - a highly moving climax to the collection, and arguably the least ambiguous in its optimism.
Some may find these films easier to admire than to truly love, but what is undeniable is that the best of the Six Moral Tales represent the crowning achievements of a true master of French film. An essential collection for fans of European cinema. GJK
Film: The Essential Eric Rohmer
Release date: 10th May 2010
Certificate: 15
Running time: 414 mins
Director: Eric Rohmer
Starring: Serge Renko, Clara Bellar, Andy Gillet
Genre: Drama/Romance
Studio: Artificial Eye
Format: DVD
Country: France
With unusual choices, this collection is an intriguing introduction for the Rohmer newbie and a refreshing reminder for the aficionado of the great man’s talents – and they couldn’t offer greater contrasts.
The Sign Of Leo (1962)
Rohmer’s debut feature tells the cautionary tale of a Paris-based American, born under the sign of Leo and confident that luck is on his side.
In anticipation of an inheritance from a recently deceased aunt, he freely wracks up debts only to find himself in dire straits when his windfall fails to materialise...
Rendez-vous In Paris (1995)
In Rendez-vous In Paris, we witness three romantic encounters. In the first, a young woman agonizes over rumours that her boyfriend is two-timing her, and through the introduction of a third party who returns her stolen purse, she is led into a revelation that will influence her future life.
Another tale takes us on a guided tour of Parisian beauty spots with two teachers who are engaged in a platonic, highly romantic love affair. She claims to be in a loveless relationship with another man; her lover waits patiently while she ponders what she will do if or when she leaves her long term partner. Will she turn to the long suffering teacher, or not?
Finally, a flirtation evolves between an artist and a young woman he encounters in a gallery. The artist pursues the girl down the street, and after engaging her in conversation they end up in his studio, discussing attraction and love. Can he win over the girl he has fallen for so quickly?
Triple Agent (2003)
Triple Agent is basically a spy movie based on a true story, set in the 1930s and given historical context with astute use of vintage news footage.
Fyodor Vorodin is a White Russian General in exile, ostensibly working quietly and lawfully for a veteran’s association. His wife, Arsinoe, is a gifted amateur artist who befriends the neighbours in the upstairs apartment. Despite knowing that her husband is fond of political conversation and debate, she is unaware that he may have a secret life beyond the mundane – until she finds out by accident that he has been taking clandestine trips to Nazi Berlin. Who is he working for, and why?
The complex espionage plot unfolds alongside an examination of several relationships notably that between Fyodor and Arsinoe, but also Arsinoe’s friendship with her neighbours.
The Romance Of Astrea And Celadon (2007)
Honore d’Urfe’s seventeenth century novel is the inspiration for the final film, The Romance Of Astrea And Celadon.
A love story set in 5th century Gaul, it opens with beautiful shepherdess Astrea rebuffing her lover Celadon - mistakenly believing he has betrayed her with another girl. Distraught at losing her love, he throws himself into the river and is believed to have drowned; in fact, he has been rescued by a trio of beautiful nymphs and nursed back to health.
Months later, Astrea wanders into his life again and Celadon is thrown into a tormented dilemma. Does he obey her last words to him to never come before her eyes again – or is there a way around her command so that he may win her back?
These films are archetypal Rohmer - gentle, beautiful, and positively academic in places. Triple Agent is more political debate than James Bond, set against a carefully reproduced historical backdrop. The characters are cultured, well educated and awfully polite to each other, even when their political views diverge wildly, but underlying this is an exploration of loyalty and truth – and the human need to pigeon-hole people (we have people living in apartments; their allegiances to various causes, and private relationships). Arsinoe’s genuine hurt and anger as she confronts her husband about his secret existence is about more than just his failure to include her in all parts of his life, it is about trust in a wider sense, and about how the innocent or naive can be manipulated by those closest to them. The vintage footage is astutely used and contributes to a growing sense of tension in the film and the colour palate used by Rohmer is subdued and gentle, and leaves one with the memory almost of an album of sepia photographs, very apt considering its setting.
Rohmer‘s artist’s eye is displayed even better in The Romance Of Astrea And Celadon. This is a gorgeous film to look at, with beautiful young characters acting in truly Elysian locations, alongside verdant meadows, delightful chateaus, and woodlands with dappled sunlight. The shepherdesses look as if they have stepped straight out of a Frederick Leighton painting, dressed as they are in flimsy versions of the Roman woman’s stola - highly impractical for the work of herding sheep (this is not a film for those who are sticklers for historical accuracy). In order to enjoy and even understand this film, complete suspension of disbelief is absolutely essential, otherwise you will be in turn bemused and irritated by what will come across as florid speeches, improbable turns of the plot and horrendous singing. For example, putting the brawny Celadon into a frock, giving him a close shave and stick-on plaits, and having him speak in a wavering falsetto should fool no woman into thinking he is female, not even the disingenuous Astrea! Concentrate instead on the sheer beauty of this film, its gentle humour and the Shakespearean turns of the plot, and let it wash over you – and when it has finished, you will also be prompted into thinking about its underlying messages of the nature of love, loyalty and trust. There is more to this film than at first appears.
More young and beautiful actors can be found in Rendez-vous In Paris, and yet more ponderings on the nature of love, trust and betrayal. This time, set against the backdrop of modern Paris, the scenarios are more accessible for those who like realism in their films - although not many real-life lovers will wander the streets engaging in philosophical discourse to the extent that these characters do. Paris is important in the film, but it is the choices that the characters must make which stand out. This is a polite comedy of manners, with pretty speeches and little twists in each of the three stories for the characters to stumble over. However, not all the characters are appealing; the female teacher in the second story can be downright irritating and behaves shabbily towards her lover, but then even Rohmer can’t have universally nice folk in his films – life just isn’t like that (except in the world of Astrea and Celadon). Underlying these stories is the seamier side of relationships - sadness, broken trust and heartbreak - but offered to us in Rohmer’s deceptively gentle way.
Although these films have some themes in common, they are sufficiently contrasting to make this collection an intriguing introduction to Eric Rohmer. Don’t forget to look for the hidden and in some places unsettling messages to make the most of these films from the French master. GR
Film: Rendez-vous In Paris
Release date: 10th May 2010
Certificate: 15
Running time: 94 mins
Director: Eric Rohmer
Starring: Clara Bellar, Antoine Basler, Mathias Megard, Michael Kraft, Judith Chancel
Genre: Drama/Romance
Studio: Artificial Eye
Format: DVD
Country: France
This film has been released alongside the Essential Eric Rohmer DVD box set to celebrate the great director’s work, and will be welcomed by his fans as a worthy tribute to one of the most famous of French filmmakers.
Three romantic encounters make up the dramatic content of the film, linked by brief musical interludes from typically, or it might be said stereotypically Parisian musicians. In the first, ‘Rendezvous At 7 O’clock’, a young woman (Clara Bellar) agonizes over rumours that her boyfriend is two-timing her, and through the introduction of a third party, who returns her stolen purse, she is led into a revelation that will influence her future actions.
The second of the triptych of stories, ‘The Benches Of Paris’, takes us on a guided tour of many Parisian beauty spots with two teachers (Aurore Rauscher and Serge Renko), who are engaged in a platonic but highly romantic love affair. She claims to be in a loveless relationship with another man; her lover waits patiently (almost implausibly so) while she ponders what she will do, if or when she leaves her long term partner. Will she turn to the long suffering teacher, or not? When the decision is eventually made to consummate the affair, by pretending to be tourists and book in to a Paris hotel, the sight of another guest causes a swift change of plan – and of heart.
Finally, in ‘Mother And Son 1907’, we witness a prolonged flirtation between an artist (Michael Kraft) and a young woman (Benedicte Loyen) he encounters in an art gallery. The artist pursues the girl down the street, and, after engaging her in conversation, they end up in his studio, not so much looking at the paintings as having a positively philosophical discussion about attraction and love. Can he win over the girl he has fallen for so quickly?
This is a beautifully mannered film, peopled with good-looking, young, romantic individuals who all seem to be either students, professionals, or involved in the world of fine art. There is an assumption by Rohmer that his viewing audience will understand all the references to Picasso, Surrealism, Cubism and the graves of famous illustrators, and he is probably right to make that assumption. Similarly, there are classical allusions in the script which reinforce the cultured and sophisticated atmosphere. There is also something of a very gentle Moliere comedy about the film, with turns of plot and elegant speeches by the characters that somehow seem almost incongruously polite in a modern setting, yet underlying these are some potentially unpleasant situations – two timing partners, break-ups and suspicion. It is Rohmer’s lightness of touch, both as director and script writer, which keeps it from falling over into torment and angst, but one is aware that the possibility is there.
Special mention has to be given to the use of Paris as a backdrop; we see numerous lovely shots of the city, both intimate in the market and park scenes, and wider ranging, with panoramas of the city. The only criticism here is that so many well known sites are used it can be distracting.
Time plays a big part in the film, too, especially in the first story. There are many references to the passage of time, dates and assignations, to the point where it is almost but not quite over played - in fact, Rohmer treads a fine line throughout the film, for example with the mannered performances (had these been overplayed, they could easily have disintegrated into pastiche, and it has to be Rohmer’s handling of the cast that has achieved this successful balance in the performances).
Despite this rather arty feel to the film and dialogue, there is another side to it. The viewer is almost an eavesdropper to the events in the film, following the characters through the market, almost bumping into them in the street as they stop abruptly to talk or embrace, so it is naturalistic despite the politeness.
Rohmer has allowed the background noises to stay at their normal level, which again adds to the sense of realism, but some may find it rather distracting; in the third story, one can clearly hear the whirr of the film camera as in the supposed silence of his studio, the artist paints his picture.
This film may not be one of Rohmer’s very best, but it is nonetheless charming, easy to watch on a superficial level and yet generous enough in its themes to allow for speculation on a deeper level. A safe choice for the beginner to the world of Rohmer, and sure to please his many ardent fans. GR
