Jacques Demy
Lola and Model Shop (the ‘sequel’)
Lola- 1961, B&W, french w/subtitles, Anouk Aimee, set in Nantes
This was Demy’s debut film. A note – the version I saw had bad subtitling, so that by the end of the film the subtitles often did not match the person speaking, it was very disconcerting by the end, however an excellent movie. 1.5H.
Model Shop- 1963, Colour, English, Set in low-rise 1960’s LA. Anouk Aimee and Gary
Lockwood, who was in 2001 A Space Odyssey. A surprise – colour and America, and pop music. 1.5H.
Viewed at Cinematheque Ontario, Aug 11/05, a double-header. Alone for the first film. I had thought Rosalind would come – she had wanted to when She, Darren and I saw Une Femme Est Une Femme on Tuesday PM and went over to ‘The Village Idiot’ for a couple glasses of wine afterwords. However I could not reach her and she did not call.
Pierre and Georg from Knox (Pierre: from Montreal, philosophy PhD studying Federalism, Georg from Frankfurt, last evening of his 2 month stay in Canada as placement from his Medical degree). Very pleased to see that Pierre and Georg both very much liked the film (Georg: Gay-org). See review below. Afterwords the three boys went and had a drink at the Idiot and than finished off Georg’s Molson Canadian and peanuts while playing cutthroat three-man elimination billiards in the basement of Knox. See photo.
(In Canada, we explained to Georg, all one needs for a good time is a six pack of Molson’s, a poorly lit basement and a pool table. We are a simple country, and this, for us, is the height of luxury).
Lola –
The attractive and almost frail Aimee is in Nantes, I think, although one might think it was Paris. She is in a Cabaret, chased by a straightforward and disarming sailor. He likes her very much, and must be leaving for America, so they are having a ‘romance’ while the other sailors visit the cabaret to dance with the leggy women ‘on demand’ (it is not a whorehouse). Lola has a young boy, blond hair, and 7 years ago her man left, without marriage. And yet – faithful Lola waits for his return expectantly, with a stringent yearning. Her childhood friend is a sort of cynical intellectual who gets fired for not caring about his work, for not liking his city or his time: he is an interesting disillusioned young man. Lola – her stage name, she is Celine, I think – and he are charmed to see one another again. He wants to take her away with him. But at the last moment, who shows up? and so she drives off, seeing her childhood friend on the street, walking, not knowing that he will not see her and that his suddenly declaration of love, out of nowhere, will be just as suddenly unrequited.
A very nice little film, with a sort of sedate enigmatic quality to Lola especially, but to the other characters as well. It is like the ‘gap’ in life is being filed, the spot between what we know and what we feel, and what we don’t know and what we don’t know we are feeling. Something like that, in any case. These characters do not ‘know’ what they want, as a business manager does: however they have a longing, and they go directly after whatever it is when it presents itself before them in circumstance.
A lovely musical score and footage.
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Model Shop.
1969
Pierre, Georg and I all admired the driving sequences as we follow the American around, for the whole movie. It’s like we see everything he does, and the music kicks in while he drives his little convertible MG through old LA. The pop music, by some band called ‘Spirit’ (featured as friends in the film) is rested from with classical sections, a great relief from the turgid swirl of 1960.
And Lo! There is Lola, from Paris, her son left behind her, and it has been, I believe, another 7 years. The young man is about 24, an architect, who has just quit his job as he cannot be bothered to wok on ‘plumbing’ when he wants to make something real, something definitive.
Filed under: 1960's, Cinematheque, Demy, Deneuve, Catherine, French, Kelly, Gene, Varda
J Demy and A Varda
1966
France
Catherine Deneuve, Gene Kelly
And Francoise Dorleac – Catherine’s older sister, who died at age 25 when her car turned over.
Technicolor, subs
Cinematheque 2008 Feb
Sold out; waited at the desk, got in free on returned ticket
IMDB
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Sure it’s over the top and there is too much dancing and singing. But who can forget the song of the two twins, born under Gemini? It’s the ‘Twin Sister’s Song’ from Michel Legrand.
The Twin Sister’s song on UTube
La Baie des Anges
Bay of angels
Jacques Demy
(From the Cinematheque series ‘Jacques Demy’s Cinema of Joy’)
France, 1962, B&W
79 minutes Cast: Jeanne Moreau, Claude Mann
Cinematheque, 2002, Tues July 09
IMDB
Also by Demy (unseen):
Lola, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Le Sabotier du Val de Loire, Les Demoiselles de Rochefort, Peau D’Ane, The Model Shop.
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A very beautiful movie. A young man works in an office in Paris. His co-worker gives him a ride home in his car; it is a new DB (Citroen). Where did he get the new car? They have the same salary. He won it gambling. And so the story begins� He begins gambling in the beautiful gambling houses, with dress codes and polite manners. He wins, he loses, he wins. His father disapproves. He gets locked out of the house, meets the ex-wife of a rich industrialist who is addicted to gambling and they run away together. Nice, other towns, money, no money, new cars, sell the new cars to pay for gambling debts. He says to his new mistress: “You must love money.” “Money?” she replies, “I can’t abide money. Look at the way I spend it.” In the end they are broke again, and broken up again. She is older then him, and addicted worse. Giving in, he writes his father, asking if he might return to Paris, and requests travel money. His father recants and sends the funds. He divides it in two, so he and the ex-industrialist’s wife can return to Paris together the next day. He wakes up in the morning and she is gone. He finds her in the casino, gambling. He asks her to come, she refuses. She tells him to choose a number. He does. it loses. She turns to him: “Get away from me! You are bad luck.”
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He leaves the casino, a shot from the casino doorway, as he slowly walks out and towards the sidewalk. She runs out, the music strikes up, she is in his arms, and the movie is over. ****, take a girl. What a shame! I saw it by myself, and not with a girl. One day, I’ll see it again, and the two of us can walk out into the warm summer air together, and get ice cream on College street.
