French Postcards (1979) User Reviews (21)

A pleasant diversion.

[Hermit C-2 · 7/10 · 3 July 1999]

This is the kind of movie the term "lighthearted" was made for. A group of American students is attending school in Paris and spending their time running around seeing the sights and finding new loves. The script may not be perfect but it's a fun and enjoyable time.

The best thing this movie has going for it is the fine French actress (and stunning beauty) Marie France-Pisier, who plays the school's headmistress and the object of one of the young men's attention and affection. Also good in this film is Blanche Baker, an underappreciated actress.

One of those rainy day movies

[cmt-2 · 7/10 · 17 October 1999]

FRENCH POSTCARDS is one of those movies you watch when there's nothing else on (at least that was the case for me). It's a harmless little movie with some nice shots of Paris and a story you've probably seen in dozens of other movies. It also has a couple of lovely French actresses (France-Piser and Quennessen)and a pretty American (Baker). And stay on the lookout for Debra Winger, before she was a star. It's a likeable movie overall.

This is a fun movie.

[critic2-2 · 7/10 · 28 May 1999]

This is a fun movie. It doesn't try to get any message across so it is easy on the eyes and brain. Everyone in the movie does a credible job. If you want to see a real beauty check out Valérie Quennessen (Toni). Also see "Summer Lovers" to see more of her. It is a shame that she has passed away. Check out "French Postcards" for a little French fun!

So Near & Dear To My Heart

[briankistler · 8 August 2002]

I would not give this film a lukewarm review at all (as some of the other reviews that I have read seem to have done). I would not try to put it in a box that it does not belong in, either. The truth of the matter is, I LOVED "French Postcards" exactly the way it was!! This was a highly entertaining and WONDERFUL story! I felt really good after watching it..........I watched it twice. In short, I thoroughly enjoyed it!

I felt that a lot of the main characters were very well drawn and believable. The acting was, by and large, superb! My favorite story within this story would have to be the one with Alex (the blond-haired American student and pianist) and Madame Tessier (the French director of the institute, where the American exchange students were enrolled). I especially like the very beautiful and adorable Mme. Tessier, played by Marie-France Pisier. It wasn't just that she was totally gorgeous as a "somewhat older woman" (Alex was a junior in college; Mme. Tessier was probably in her mid 30s). It was very admirable how passionate she was about her study abroad program. She appeared to be extremely devoted to her job.........and very professional. Toward the end of the movie she talked about her plan to open up schools all over France........and she was very excited about it.

I also liked that scene when she and Alex's girlfriend got into a cat fight over whose man Alex really was..........but even then, she still carried that off with a lot of class. She did not scream or make a scene. She seemed to hold her own, toe to toe, with Alex's old girlfriend with dignity. Among other things, she told her (in a very relaxed voice):

"You are a twenty-year-old school girl..........You don't know anything about love!"

If you have not yet seen the movie, you should know that Mme. Tessier certainly made Alex pay his dues! He worked extremely hard to earn the right to show his affections for her. She was really quite cold, in the beginning, and did try to dissuade him...........even lied to him that she did not like a piano song that he wrote for her (about Paris). Eventually she took the bait (and probably amazed Alex in the process). The story does paint Mme. Tessier as a very dedicated and serious, professional, French woman: a woman, who one day just had a weakness and caved............and allowed herself to become vulnerable in the arms, and in the heart, of a twenty-something American "stud". Though for many people it might be disturbing, that her involvement with him is adulterous (her husband is her business partner at the institute), in many ways it is a very sweet romance. There are actually quite a few things that are sweet (or delightful) about this movie (including a shot of the beautiful Seine river at sunset).

I saw this movie on HBO in December 1980------just weeks before I was slated to go off to Spain as an American college student (I spent my spring semester in Sevilla, Spain). Though this movie was about a very different country, it was still about a European country. It was extremely exciting for me to watch two hours of anecdotes, concerning experiences that I was very soon to be having (at least some of them, anyway; I did not try to steal away a program director's wife!)! Watching this film was even more delightful for me, since this was to be my first trip to Europe!

I am sure that I would have enjoyed this movie, almost as much, even if I had not studied abroad. On a personal note, I never made it to France, during my stay in Spain. It would be 17+ years later, before I trod on many of the same grounds that Alex, Joel, and Melanie trod (in "French Postcards"). I am pleased to say that my 1998 trip to France was everything that I thought it would be! The people were totally wonderful and delightful..........and I just loved them! More importantly, I loved France (just as I loved Mme. Tessier and "French Postcards", as a whole)!

The garishly goofy 'French Postcards' gets my stamp of approval!

[Weirdling_Wolf · 7/10 · 10 December 2021]

This fitfully flavoursome fromage about a naïve group of over-excitable American students experiencing a modestly hedonistic year of wine, women, and deliciously bad French rock music at a school in picturesque Paris, perhaps, offers the more forgiving, farce-minded viewers some fairly stale Poisson out of water shtick. These disparate, moderately endearing student protagonists 'studying' at the somewhat less-than august-looking 'Institute of French Studies' predictably fall into distinctly pre-digested food groups, the lonely, uptight wasp busybody (Blanche Baker), the nebbish nerd that somewhat miraculously gets the lava-hot mademoiselle (Miles Chapin), the self-appointed, would-be artisan Lothario (David Marshall Grant) who frustratingly gets the bums rush, and a youthful, barely used, quick-quipping Debra Winger form the savoury base of this salty bouillabaisse! There are noisome, sardonic skits about eating snails, clunky ruminations about the myriad, meaningless miasmas of human existence, a smattering of not so amiable couplings, some bemusingly bad, frisson-less bedroom farcing about, and a scintillatingly sexy sprinkle of groovy Gallic disco, plus an abjectly awful cameo by Mandy Patinkin as a skeezoid Iranian on the make, and legendary French Thespian Jean Rochefort's justifiably acerbic disdain for his students seems wholly genuine, and Huyck's sickly saccharine conclusion is nauseatingly glib, but, for reasons that momentarily elude me, there is something weirdly edifying about the ingenuous Miles Chapin heroically hooking up with a sublimely frisky French hottie (Valérie Quennessen), so, maybe, I somewhat reluctantly enjoyed the benign, wholesomely fluffy-headed frolics in 'French Postcards' a little more than I would be prepared to admit in public! The garishly goofy 'French Postcards gets my stamp of approval! All winsome word-japery aside, I genuinely dug on Lee Holdrige's magnifique score, and the gracefully beautiful Marie-France Pisier is truly mesmerizing to behold as wet dream supreme, the triumphantly titillating teacher Madame Catherine Tessier!

Delightful fluff... look for stars-to-be

[jamieric · 10/10 · 12 February 2002]

"French Postcards" is a light-hearted romantic comedy that was probably seen by more people on cable TV than in the theater.

Two rising stars have supporting roles in this film.

Mandy Patinkin plays "Sayyid." He won a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical for playing Che Guevera in "Evita" on Broadway in 1979... the same year "French Postcards" was released. He went on to star opposite Barbra Streisand in the film "Yentl," and to act in many other movies including another favorite of mine, "The Princess Bride." He's appeared in numerous Broadway productions and also played for years in the TV series "Chicago Hope."

The other actor to watch for is Debra Winger who plays "Melanie." She went on to roles in "Urban Cowboy," "An Officer and a Gentleman," and "Terms of Endearment," and is a three-time Oscar nominee.

As a reporter, I got to interview Winger when "Cannery Row" was released and asked her about her memories of "French Postcards." She said she was not happy about the way the film turned out because "Melanie" apparently played a much larger role in the original script as shot. She felt too much of her work was left on the cutting room floor during editing, and that her major character had been relegated to a lesser role. Judging from what's happened since, she was probably right.

After "French Postcards," Willard Huyck went on to direct the bombs "Best Defense," and "Howard the Duck."

Gentle, Sweet Coming of Age Film for the Romantic

[imdb-3663 · 8/10 · 14 May 2004]

This film is a must see for anyone who has ever been an American exchange student abroad. It perfectly captures the mixture of foreignness and familiar that is part and parcel of the exchange experience. The different types of approaches that one might have to an exchange year abroad are well illustrated.

It is, by no means, a great film, but it continues to endure in my memory as a good representation of what my year in Brazil, broadly speaking, was like. Lots of attractive actors, beautiful scenes and a surprising amount of humorous and witty dialog.

I have this on videotape, but the soundtrack has been changed from the original release and the subsequent showings on HBO. The most noticeable change is the opening scene on the bus. Madame Tessier is welcoming the new exchange students to France and tells them they need to immerse themselves in French culture and leave America behind. The bus driver, irritated with her prattling, pops in a tape of a band doing a French version of Do You Believe In Magic (The Lovin' Spoonful). It totally captures how American culture has infiltrated the world's cultures. In the videotape release they replace this song with some generic pop music. They must not have been willing to pay for the musical rights to the song. It's not quite as effective, but it is still a great start to a fun, romantic movie about coming of age in a foreign land.

This truly is a delightful, lite film that will give you a 95 minute taste of living abroad. Rent it if you can and hope that it shows up on DVD sometime soon.

Have Always Loved This Movie....

[msdemos · 8/10 · 8 July 2018]

.

Ever fall in love with a movie, you know in your heart isn't the greatest of all time, but for whatever reason, you love it anyway ???

For me, this is that movie.

First saw it a few years after it's 1979 release on an early pay-per-view service (possibly, SelecTV ???), and fell hopelessly, head-over-heels in love with it.

I think it was probably because most of the actors in it are my age, and thus, was able to live vicariously through them, in effect, getting to "go" to school in France, even though I've never been there.....

Sadly, two of the lovely women starring in it, died before their time, Marie-France Pisier ("Madame Tessier") at 66 (drowning), and Valérie Quennessen ("Toni") at a FAR too young 31 (car accident). And if you've never seen Ms. Quennessen in 1982's "Summer Lovers", do yourself a favor and track it down (again, maybe not the greatest film of all time, but the STUNNING scenes of GORGEOUS Greece (and Ms. Quennessen!), are worth the price of 'admission' alone!).

SO pleased too, that this film FINALLY got a dvd release, after so many, MANY years not being available on home video (though it did have a release on VHS, prior to that).

To anyone with a little bit of 'romance' left in your heart, give this one a chance......to those who don't, or can't remember the feeling of being young and in love, don't bother.....

.

FRENCH POSTCARDS DVD with Altered Music!

[shemp47-1 · 10/10 · 7 November 2008]

I'm just watching the new DVD release of French Postcards and I'm sorry to say they have substituted all the music with elevator muzak. This is really a shame in that the original music soundtrack was one of the best things about this film. It was French language versions of pop hits such as "Do You Believe In Magic?" and "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?" that was most memorable. This is still a fine film and I recommend it but I wish they would bring back the original soundtrack. I remember seeing this film on HBO back in the eighties when they ran the same film ten times a day and I would watch it just for the soundtrack. I advise you try to find an old VHS version with the original music. Also Debra Winger's role is so small it's ridiculous they try to promote it as "starring Debra Winger".

Outstanding Movie - Please come to DVD!

[kc1959 · 10/10 · 9 November 2004]

I think this is one of the best "coming of age" movies ever made. I think it was a victim of the US/Iran problems of 1979. Had the Iranian problem not happened, I believe this would have been more widely viewed originally, and more of a hit. The performances are excellent. Seeing Debra Winger before her rise to stardom is worth the price. It's sad to me to know that Valerie Quennessen died in 1989. I also loved the performance of Marie-France Pisier. Mandy Patinkin was so good in this movie. I love his comedy performances. Being filmed on location in Paris (and the surrounding countryside) along with the performances of genuine French actors gives this movie the realism necessary to believe all the characters. We all have had the wide-eyed innocence that makes this film perfect. I wish there would be a release on DVD. My VHS tape could run thin after a few more viewings.

French Postcards is an underrated film

[Doriano · 10/10 · 23 February 2014]

Do not bother watching the version of French Postcards that you can buy today on DVD because they totally ruined it by replacing the original soundtrack which was perfect. This includes the opening scene on the bus ride when it used to be a french version of Do You Believe in Magic"! There was also a sweet scene near the end with Nicolette Larson's "Lotta Love" which is destroyed by its replacement. Many more scenes are ruined by the replacement music. I hate when this happens. Ridley Scott usually does this. I have same complaint of his LEGEND which is much better with the original soundtrack.

I have the original version which I copied from A&E from the 1980s that I converted to DVD. Poor quality but it's the best version!

The cast was tremendous including young future stars Mandy Pantinkin and Debra Winger in small but funny roles. Valérie Quennessen is a revelation..she went on to star in Summer Lovers 3 years later but died young in a tragic car accident. Miles Chapman does an awesome Woody Allen type performance and David Marshall Grant is fantastic. The writers Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck also penned the classic American Graffitti and the first draft of Star Wars (uncredited).

I admit to loving this movie for personal reasons as I traveled abroad after high school and lived in Italy for a while and experienced life changing things like the characters in this movie. I highly recommend traveling whether you are young or old. It broadens your heart and mind.

Light and trite but I loved it anyways

[smalljas-2 · 10/10 · 24 April 1999]

OK, French Postcards is my guilty pleasure film of all time. It doesn't try hard to achieve anything (dare I say even European, in its approach), which makes the film a delight to watch compared to most coming of age/college comedies. Plus, anything with the beautiful Valérie Quennessen (sadly no longer with us) is worth watching. Maybe way past its sell-by date today (hell, so is Diva), but if you were born in the Sixties, just the ticket to wax nostalgia about that year abroad (even if you never did it).

MY FAVORITE COMING OF AGE MOVIE

[atlantic965 · 20 November 2001]

I first saw this film in 1979 when it appeared on HBO. And it is MY coming of age movie. I found the tape recently in a video store and it brought back many happy memories. I was sad to learn Valérie Quennessen was killed in an auto accident in 1989. She was a beautiful and talented actress. Marie-France Pisier is still one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen, the one actor, who in my opinion, steals the movie is the great French actor Jean Rochefort who plays Monsieur Tessier. I sometimes cannot believe 22 years have passed since I first saw this movie. A must See !!

Wow! Who'd've thunk it!?!

[tattoo_charlie · 8/10 · 12 May 2003]

It's funny how cruising the internet will take us off on some of the most trivial tangents! I just purchased a film ("Sleep With Me" with Eric Stoltz, Meg Tilly and a cameo appearance -- NOT to be missed -- by Quentin Tarantino) and thought I'd look for "French Postcards" . . . another of my long-time favorites.

I thought I was the ONLY one who had even SEEN this film much less had such fond memories of it!!

Like so many, I first saw the film via cable . . . either on Cinemax or HBO. I was in Michigan on internship and while visiting my future (now ex-) wife, I caught this wonderful little film on her VERY little b/w television. I liked it so much that I watched it at almost every opportunity as it ran its repetitive course.

As has been posted already here, I saw a little bit of me in many of the characters (not so much in Sayyid, of course!!). I also found many of the characters to be very believable — as well as the story. My guess is that it was probably written by someone who'd had such an experience.

I suppose that I related mostly to Alex, who -- despite being somewhat of a lech — was an utter romantic. Like him, I'm a songwriter AND hopelessly drawn to romance. The song he sings ("Paris") was in my head for days and weeks . . . MONTHS after watching the film.

I was particularly attracted to Laura (Blanche Baker's character), who — much like Alex — was in love with romance and tried so very hard to experience her preconceived notions about Paris. While Alex's affair with Madame Tessier was rather titillating (I mean, isn't it EVERY young man's dream to have an affair with an older, married woman?!?), I rooted for Laura and Alex to get together.

Many of us here can probably also relate with the dweeb-y (initially), socially clumsy Joel. That he was able to finally come to grips with his feelings for Toni and EXPRESS them was — IS — something we'd all like to be capable of doing all the time. We probably all initially took affront to Toni's brusque responses to Joel, but (sigh!) fell in love with her as well (if ONLY for her accent!).

Although Debra Winger's part is so very small, her character was entertaining.

And while we're speaking "French" . . . I highly, highly, HIGHLY recommend "Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain" (Amélie) if you haven't yet seen it.

An old cable TV memory...

[z_crito2001 · 30 July 2001]

Where we lived didn't get cable TV until Dec. 1980 and this is the first film I can recall seeing on cable TV. It's funny but I'm pretty sure I've probably only seen this film just once but I remember most of it till this day.

Is this the best damn film ever made ? Uh, no. But this is just a sentimental one with me and I think if you see yourself in any or part of the characters in this film then you'll probably like it. And I think I saw myself in about two of them. I was even scheduled to take French 101 the next semester at school.

I read the other reviews on this Web page and I vaguely remember what Valérie Quennessen looked like but it's coming back to me (That teeny-tiny picture on this film's main Web page helps too). She was the shorthaired French girl that looks like ‘Trois couleurs: Rouge' (1994) Irène Jacob (or is it the Blue one's Juliette Binoche? I'm not sure it's been a long time.) I did think at the time she was kind of snooty in her initial behavior toward the character that was interested in her. Give the guy a break; he was several thousand miles from home and had difficulty speaking the language !

Note: Not only has miss Quennessen passed away but the only song I remember used in it Nicolette Larson's `Lotta Love', it seems she also passed away a couple of years ago.

Does this film really deserve its low rating that the 60 or so people who saw it gave it? Heck, I'll give it a 7 or 8 out of 10 and I've never given a film a 10 rating yet.

If you want to see this film then good luck. I've never seen it in a video store or for sale for that matter. It must be out of print.

If I ever see this thing again I'll write another comment on it. I'm curious if it's aged well.

Also, for the few people who've commented on it – thanks. I think I would value the opinion of someone who saw something or anything worthwhile in this film.

`A fellow will remember a lot of things you wouldn't think he'd remember. You take me. One day, back in 1896, I was crossing over to Jersey on the ferry, and as we pulled out, there was another ferry pulling in, and on it there was a girl waiting to get off. A white dress she had on. She was carrying a white parasol. I only saw her for one second. She didn't see me at all, but I'll bet a month hasn't gone by since that I haven't thought of that girl.' -- Bernstein [Citizen Kane 1941].

Another one who saw this when I was 15...

[tdr0327 · 8/10 · 16 September 2005]

Yes, I'm another one of those who saw this on cable TV back in 1980 or so. Only it wasn't on HBO, because my family didn't have that. It was probably on Star Channel (Anybody else remember that one? It was the forerunner of The Movie Channel.) And they probably played it way more than every other day. More like every other movie. Back then they would rotate about 2 or 3 movies all day long. I don't know how many times I saw Caddyshack and The Stunt Man.

I fell in love with French Postcards as soon as I saw the opening credits. I was really disappointed when I found that the VHS version didn't have the French language "Do You Believe in Magic." I think my brother held his tape recorder up to the TV and has it on a cassette tape somewhere. I wonder if it has held up for 25 years. Unfortunately this was a few years prior to videotape recorders so none of us could tape the actual movie. I had to settle for buying the VHS with the altered opening song.

Really charming, sweet movie and I'm impatiently waiting for it to appear on widescreen DVD (with the original soundtrack).

a most pleasant find

[krazykat29 · 8 September 2003]

Happened upon this movie on hbo and became a total sucker for it. What a great little movie. Why I never heard of this movie before now is something I can't figure out. It's one of those movies that stands the test of time, even if it's only twenty odd years.

A great, emblematic movie...that is if memory serves

[wassduo · 8/10 · 7 September 2008]

I would definitely recommend this movie, if - and it's a big "if" - it is the one I am thinking of. I carefully researched this issue before posting and I am 90% certain this movie is the one I think it is since no others seem to fit the bill - ensemble cast, plot about American students studying in France, personal development.

I had HBO as a teenager growing up in the 80s and remember watching an oddly engaging romance film (my normal fair back then was "Mad Max" and "Commando") about a troupe of US college students studying abroad and going through a series of personal contortions that held lessons on maturity. In 1989-1990, I actually went on a one-year study abroad myself and as I experienced life in Luxemburg, which is where I went, I kept remembering this movie.

In a broad macro way it captured much of what I felt and perceived to be going on in my life and that of my fellow. There were romantic entanglements within the student body and with the locals - though there was certainly no "The Graduate" Mrs. Anderson-type of thing - and personality clashes and blossoming friendships. I have vivid recollections from my time abroad of seeing and experiencing events that caused my mind to hearken back to this movie repeatedly.

The fact that this movie is so intertwined with my experience is, actually, what speaks out to me most. For me, the movie somehow captured the oddity of the overseas experience; that going far away from home forced us closer to ourselves. It prompted honest and clear introspection and, through that process, maturation. Time and again, I participated in or witnessed deep heartfelt and thoughtful conversations about personal development and insight that were almost entirely absent from what I had seen stateside. We discussed the ugly and the beautiful in people and saw both. Oddly, it built a durable sense of comradeship such that many of the friendships that began in Lux, as we called it, endured through the remainder or college and beyond.

It is seemingly odd to attach so much meaning to a movie I saw only once and have never seen again but, actually, I think it is remarkable. I will say this, the movie put a lens on my experience that was very helpful to me.

Putting aside the falsities that are inherent in any fictional enterprise, there is some essence of the truth of the overseas experience that is captured by this film that makes it worth viewing. Perhaps, it is the drama. That is what stands out. Passionate discussions in bars while surrounded by people who, to you, are speaking a foreign language.

"French Postcards" could be viewed as an existential allegory. We are separate and alone to a degree even in the midst of a crowd while simultaneously - in contrast to existentialism - the mere fact we are engaged in a dialog with another is proof that we are not alone. It is proof of a duality of aloneness and comradeship that makes up a person's life.

Now that I got that off my chest, I want to get on Amazon or Netflix and see if I can lay hands on a copy to confirm the truth of my lamentations.

One of my nostalgic faves!

[gabialoha3 · 9/10 · 7 July 2019]

Not so much a review as a heartfelt comment. I was 19 when this came out. After watching this I wanted to be an exchange student so bad!! But alas, never made it happen. I enjoy all the pop references of the time and the music. The actors at the time were also just starting out and I've enjoyed following some of their careers and how they have developed over the years. Anyhow, this is a sweet, warm comfort movie for me and when I watch it it brings such good memories to my mind.

there is something about this film

[sergio-45 · 10/10 · 29 June 2000]

there is something about this film...when i was 15-16, it seemed that it was on HBO every other day. and i watched it every time! of course i had such a crush on Valérie Quennessen (Toni) and i can say i am actually crushed to learn of her death. but there was a lot more to the film than just your average teenage crush. i can't explain the feelings it gave me of another world, far away.

turns out that neither kozmo nor urbanfetch have it, so am going to have to go on a quest now to find it.

if you haven't seen this movie, do so! it is light, not too heavy on the mind or the heart, but leaves just enough of an impression on both that you won't forget it!

looking forward to "french postcards"

[caulfield8 · 26 July 2007]

i have just ordered "french postcards" from amazon.com. (a VHS version is the only thing i could find.) i am looking forward to seeing it for the first time. the reason i am curious about the film is that Valérie Quennessen. the reason i got curious is that i recently saw (for the first time in 25 years) "summer lovers." that movie was ALMOST a very good character study--it couldn't seem to decide whether it want to be as such, or a soft-porn erotic movie. anyway, i did a quick internet search on valerie and was kind of stunned to learn that she died in a car crash at age 31 in 1989. very sad. i also was enticed by the fact that after "summer lovers," she all but bagged Hollywood in favor of a family life. (i would like to know if she ever married and/or had children.) i respect the fact that she had just starred in a hit movie and then tossed it all away for a better purpose. anyone with some details on her life, please post them.