Un amour de pluie (1974)
33KUn amour de pluie (1974). 1h 36m
“Yet another of those French films that just catch a moment in time and the bitter-sweet fleeting relationships of people, shot with attractive photography, backed by charming music and centred on a good-looking pair of adulterous lovers. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eBored rich wife Élizabeth and her teenage daughter Cécile leave Paris for a few daysu0026#39; holiday in a spa hotel at Vittel run by the effervescent and ever-swigging Madame Édith. Élizabeth soon succumbs to a another guest, a mysterious solitary Italian called Giovanni, while Cécile promises her virginity to a lad in the kitchens called Georges. Thatu0026#39;s all there is: no plot, no action, and no character development beyond the fact that every love affair changes a woman at least a little.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eIt would be going too far to say the story enters the territory of Chekhov, though it is reminiscent of his tales of empty lives. For no political, cultural or spiritual dimension clutters the simple account of the parallel encounters. Echoes of French history intrude very tangentially when the characters visit Colombey-les-Deux-Églises, already turning into a shrine to the recently departed General de Gaulle, and a fountain at Domrémy-la-Pucelle allegedly used by Joan of Arc, a previous saviour of the nation. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eDirector and scenarist Jean-Claude Brialy gives himself an amusing cameo when he reprises his brief rôle in u0026quot;Les 400 coupsu0026quot; as a man trying to pick up a beautiful woman. Back in 1959 it was Jeanne Moreau and here it is the delectable Romy Schneider, whose charm carried the picture for me.”
