Mississippi Mermaid / La Sirène du Mississippi (1969 François Truffaut)

It is true that Truffaut - Chronicler of Love's Adventures - makes his first film which focuses solely on a one-to-one relationship (as observed in de Baecque & Toubiana's terrific book), albeit one that involves betrayal, murder, attempted murder, theft and lies, though ultimately, redemption. Let's have a look at how interesting it is.

Location. Who's even heard of La Réunion, a French colony off the eastern coast of Africa, an exotic place well caught by Denys Clerval (in widescreen Dyaliscope), often from the back seat of a convertible:

Action them moves to Nice, Aix-en-Provence, (not Paris, where our heroine really wants to end up) and finally Chartreuse (standing in for Switzerland), exactly where Truffaut shot Shoot the Pianist, even featuring the same cabin.

Casting: Belmondo against type (though featuring one of his typical acrobatic moments), Deneuve, because Truffaut thought she had a face which was mysterious, always hiding something (and perhaps why Buñuel cast her twice in two of his most successful pictures; Hitch also surely would have loved to get his 30mm lens on her*), Michel Piccoli as the dogged detective and Truffaut's accountant Marcel Berbert ('to save money'!)

Score: Antoine Duhamel. Not your average score (though quite distinctive of the composer of Weekend).

Really good with lots of enhancing details e.g. the voice recording she makes which is immediately smashed; the Snow White cartoon; the fact at the end where we're surprised to see her come back at all. You really don't get many films like this to the kilo.

*And I learned later that his last film project was to star Deneuve...