Pour le weekend

Our French favourites: Deneuve, Dorleac, Adjani & Huppert, Aimee, Audran, Hardy, Laforet .... plenty on them at labels! 

Male Hunt, 1964

Here's a rarity indeed - I had not even heard of it until pal Jerry found it - AND it features a lot of those European favourites early in their careers back at the dawn of the 1960s. LA CHASSE A L'HOMME (MALE HUNT) features Belmondo, Brialy, Claude Rich, Catherine Denueve and her sister Francoise Dorleac (their only other teaming apart from LES DEMOISELLES DE ROCHEFORT in 1967), as well as marvellous Marie Laforet, plus Bernadette Lafont and Micheline Presle, Michel Serrault.

Shot mainly in Paris, it includes locations at Rhodes and the ruins at Lindos - a favourite place of mine. It comes across now as an unpretentious comedy, directed by Edouard Molinaro, with a lot of attractive young players, no doubt made for the home market - which is probably why we never heard of it in London then. Belmondo has a nice bit as his usual young rascal. 

This captivating comedy has a number of amusing twists and turns. It stars Jean-Claude Brialy who is determined to get married despite efforts of some people to dissuade him including Claude Rich and Jean-Paul Belmondo. Catherine Denueve, Marie Laforet and Francoise Dorleac are some of the girls. Dorleac is extremely good here, she has never been better, and Laforet is as eye-catching as she was in PLEIN SOLEIL. 

Molinaro (who later directed LA CAGE AUX FOLLES) had a very good eye for comedy. IMDB lists it as a 1964 film but it looks earlier to me - most of the cast were firmly established by then.

Girls & guitars, 2 . . .

Three of our favourite girls - since the 1960s - and their guitars. They go on, decade after decade ...

Marie Laforet  (our favourite from PLEIN SOLEIL/PURPLE NOON) in ST TROPEZ BLUES, 1961

Francoise Hardy  (my teenage crush) 

Joni Mitchell - evergreen.     More on all them at labels. 

I remember watching Joni waiting to go on at The Royal Festival Hall in 1970, the hippie princess with her guitar, standing at the side of the stage, not thinking I would be talking to her 2 years later in Kings Road, Chelsea .... as detailed previously. 

Delon & Laforet, again

And to round off this session on 1960s French glamour, here once again are some terrific stills of Alain Delon and Marie Laforet in Rene Clement's PLEIN SOLEIL from Patricia Highsmith's THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY .... feel the heat of the mediterranean ...

The Ripleys again: Matt or Alain?

We had to have another look at THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY on television once again, the other day, despite rushing to it when released in 1999 and seen it several times since. It is Anthony Minghella's glossy adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's classic novel and is an engaging, if hollow, thriller in bright Italian sunshine. Minghella though, as per his published screenplay, greatly expands on the novel fleshing out characters, played by Cate Blanchett and Jack Davenport, who are barely mentioned by Highsmith. Cate is rich girl Meredith, while Jack is Ripley's new love - whom he has to get rid of in order to continue his duplicitous new life. 

We note also how Dickie is made more of a heel - getting that local girl pregnant and his indifference when she drowns herself - so presumably we the audience do not feel too bad when he is bumped off - but of course Jude Law is so charismatic here the film drifts once he is not there to tease and taunt Matt Damon's nerdy needy Tom. So its an overlong, drawn out affair as our glamorous people act out Highsmith's chilling tale. Philip Seymour Hoffman scores too in that key small role

What sinks it for me is the trowelled-on Fifties period detail - all those fussy '50s fashions they wear, with hats and gloves. Whereas in Rene Clement's PLEIN SOLEIL, the 1959 original, they were smart casual clothes that would still be fashionable now, they look strikingly modern in fact - and 24 year old Alain Delon, stunnng Marie Laforet and Maurice Ronet as Dickie are all perfectly right. Its a shorter tale, and even with that changed ending, it works better. Delon in that ice blue suit strolling around the market, and Marie Laforet as Marge strumming that guitar surrounded by her Fra Angelico prints, and the tensions of the three of them on the boat, and of course Dickie suddenly realising he is in danger after pushing Tom too far ... all set on the real mediterranean of 1959 as captured by Henri Decae's glowing colours. 

I have written a lot about PLEIN SOLEIL here, see the labels below, It is of course the tale of how New York wannabe Tom Ripley's life changes after he is sent to Italy to haul back errant playboy Dickie Greenleaf. In the 1999 version Matt Damon makes Ripley suitably sinister and needy and Jude Law is at his charismatic best as the wastrel rich boy whom Ripley wants for himself or failing that to be him, taking over his life ...just as Delon and Ronet played it in 1959.
I first saw that version when 14 in 1960, when it opened my eyes to European glamour and beauty. Its a seminal movie for me. as much as 2001, BLOW-UP, or LA NOTTE BRAVA, SANDRA, MODESTY BLAISE, WHATS NEW PUSSYCAT? etc. but THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY is fascinating too.

'60s moments ...

Some new images from some of our favourite Sixties classics:

Joseph Losey directing Monica Vitti as MODESTY BLAISE in 1966, Sarah Miles and Sean Caffrey in County Clare, Ireland in 1965 for Desmond Davis's I WAS HAPPY HERE, and below, Delon and Ronet re-teamed in Deray's glossy thriller LA PISCINE in 1969, with Romy Schneider. 

Below, filmed in 1959 (as was Antonioni's L'AVVENTURA) but on screens in 1960, Rene Clement's PLEIN SOLEIL (aka PURPLE NOON, now with a new lease of life and looking even better on Blu-ray), where Maurice Ronet, Delon and Marie Laforet are all spell-binding, as per my other Plein Soleil posts (see label), and also 1959 again, those LA NOTTE BRAVA boys, Pasolini's young hoodlums as directed and glamorised by Mauro Bolognini - Jean-Claude Brialy, Laurent Terzieff, Tomas Milian. We like Jean Sorel too, as per previous posts on him, very busy in the '60s and '70s, with lots of thriller and giallo genre movies, as well as choice items like Visconti's SANDRA where he and Claudia Cardinale are a stunning couple. Here he is with Carroll Baker, whom he made a few thrillers, such as THE SWEET BODY OF DEBORAH in 1969 ...

New Plein Soleil on Blu-Ray

That new PLEIN SOLEIL Blu-ray arrived today, and its terrific. This is the English StudioCanal one, I already got the US Criterion (right). This English has has extras on interesting restoration comparisons, and an extensive recent interview with its star Alain Delon - who is very fulsome on Rene Clement and his influence on him, plus he mentions Romy's appearance in it; plus an over an hour long documentary on its making, so now I feel I know everything there is to about PLEIN SOLEIL. Pity no Marie Laforet interview though. Highly recommended then, and the film is still dazzling, as is that 1959 Mediterranean ... and without that padding that Minghella included in his 1999 version. 
For me though Clement kind of peaked with PLEIN SOLEIL, his following films were just not in the same league, though LES FELINS with Delon again in 1963 is a ritzy thriller. 1947's LES MAUDITS and GERVAISE were interesting discoveries a while back (thanks John), and I really like KNAVE OF HEARTS (Gerard Philipe label) and 1958's THE SEA WALL, as mentioned here several times ...

Showpeople: Girls with guitars ...

Girls with guitars ...

Bardot

Francoise Hardy

Marie Laforet

Joni Mitchell - still playing after all those years.

Joan Armatrading

and stars and their disks:  Romy and Alain, 1959 - and Rock, sometime in the fifties.

 

Coming soon: Rock (another, like Dirk, who knew/met everyone) and his pals at play.