Saturday 11 July 2020

Bonjour Tristesse (1958 Otto Preminger)

Can't argue with myself.

I had posited a Jean Seberg / Paris triple bill (this followed by A Bout de Souffle and In the French Style) but Homeland had to be concluded, and that was rather like eating a three course dinner and then being invited for goat curry.

According to anothermag.com, 'Truffaut was smitten with the “boyish malice” in Seberg’s eyes as rich kid Cécile, a dreamy yet disconcertingly worldly teen summering with her playboy dad (David Niven) in the south of France. “When Jean Seberg is on screen you can’t look at anything else,” wrote Truffaut, sensing, as Assayas did with [Kristen] Stewart, that Seberg was a new kind of film star. “Her every movement is graceful, each glance is precise. The shape of her head, her silhouette, her walk, everything is perfect; this kind of sex appeal hasn’t been seen on the screen.” ' She's about 19 here.

The haunting theme song is sung by Juliette Greco, lyrics Arthur Laurents and music by Georges Auric. Classy Saul Bass credits too.


Mylène Demongeot is the 'brilliant' young girlfriend of David Niven, Geoffrey Horne the studious boy across the bay.

In a very international production, it's interesting to see that Brit Denys Coop is Georges Perinal's operator.

It was apparently filmed at La Fossette, the villa owned at the time by the founder of newspaper France-Soir, Pierre Lazareff.

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