I understand that this is the film that brought Isabelle Huppert, already the accomplished veteran of over 20 films and yet just 22-years-old, to the forefront of the French cinema. It is not hard to see why. She is apple sweet in her red hair and freckles and her pretty face and her cute little figure playing Pomme, a Parisian apprentice hairdresser. She is shy about sex and modest--just an ordinary French girl who hopes one day to be a beautician. Along comes François (Yves Beneyton) a tall, handsome, young intellectual from a petite bourgeois family who sweeps her off her feet.
They set up housekeeping and eventually he gets around to introducing her to his family. Alas, Mom finds the girl "decent," and ...well, it's rather predictable. You should watch. I've seen the story a number of times, and I find it rather painful, especially because in this case Huppert is so incredibly sweet and adorable. It is a naturalistic love story, like something from a nineteenth century novel, sad, compelling, bittersweet and ultimately tragic in an all too familiar way.
Claude Goretta's direction is lean and finely cut, and he does a great job with Huppert. There are moments of pure genius, especially the stunning final shot in which Pomme suddenly turns to the camera, on her face a vaguely hopeful, enigmatic expression. It lingers just long enough so that we realize this really is the end, and the lights are about to come up. The shot is especially effective because we can see the posters from Greece on the walls that reveal that what she just told François was a kind of proud make-believe story. Also very well done without undue emphasis is the scene where Pomme goes to him at the window in their apartment, presenting herself to him, so to speak, her naked little self so vulnerable, and he is not interested. Nothing more need to be said. It is like the turn in a sonnet: everything changes.
Without the beguiling child-like, but deeply experienced and finely expressed performance by Mademoiselle Huppert, this film would still be good, but nothing special. She carries the film: her timing, her intense concentration, her sense of who she is and how she feels at every moment is just perfect. She is exquisite.
For those of you familiar with the work of Isabelle Huppert, this is a film not to be missed.
(Note: Over 500 of my movie reviews are now available in my book "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote!" Get it at Amazon!)
