Customer Reviews

Jacques Demy's Lola

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you love "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg", then you must get "Lola". "Lola" is a good film on its own. However, seeing Lola will enrich your love of "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg". That's because you would better understand Roland Cassard (played by Marc Michel), the rich man who married the girl played by Catherine Deneuve in "The Umbrellas".

(See also the first review posted here by a viewer from NJ which is very informative).

Ever see Jacques Demy's lovely "Umbrellas of Cherbourg"? This is the film he made BEFORE Umbrellas - and the central character is Roland Cassard, the second man in Umbrellas. "Lola" stands by itself as a lovely introduction to Demy's world - boy meets girl, boy loses girl to her first love, boy goes off to smuggle diamonds (and reappears in Umbrellas as a diamond merchant). Very much worth seeing if you enjoy Umbrellas, and it could give you a new perspective on that excellent movie.

Originally conceived as a Technicolor musical but shot on the cheap (so cheap they couldn't even afford a sound crew), Jacques Demy's Lola isn't exactly the masterpiece critics claimed back in 1960, but it is one of the more likable films of the French New Wave, largely because it's less concerned with scoring stylistic points and more interested in people. What's particularly refreshing is that Demy likes these people - all of them, without exception - and never judges them, and that generosity of spirit carries it a long way. Following the role coincidence plays in our lives through its characters whose paths and hearts cross, it staves off complete schmaltz with an awareness that one person's happy ending is often another's missed possibility of happiness: Demy may not be able to resist giving one character a Hollywood Happy Ending, but it does come at a price to another, while other characters lives are left unresolved. There are a few moments where Anouk Aimee's tart with a heart overdoes the Marilyn impersonations (an affectation of the character rather than the actress) and Allan Scott's English dialogue sounds like it's been dubbed by a German reading phonetically, but they're fairly fleeting irritants and there's more than enough elsewhere to make up for it, not least Raoul Coutard's lovingly shot black and white Scope photography of Nantes.

The 2.35:1 widescreen transfer transfer, taken from a restored version, is good but not outstanding (though with the budgetary limitation the filmmakers had in 1960, it's doubtful it could look much better). Aside from the original theatrical trailer it also includes an extract from the documentary The World of Jacques Demy about the making of the film, though for the section dealing with the forgotten US sequel, Model Shop, you'll have to buy the documentary (available separately) itself.

Jacques Demy had a special way of viewing the world. He loved women and he was an incurable romantic. This delicate movie about a melancholy, gorgeoous woman in Nantes, France, who "dances" with sailors to earn a living while pining after her true love is a bittersweet poetic ode to the romantic in all of us. Anouk Aimee who was stunning years later in A Man and a Woman gave one of her best performances in this film, with a charming music score by Michel Legrand (and themes that would reappear in The Umbrellas of Cherbourg). Lola was recently restored so it looks very good on this DVD but I wish they hadn't used yellow subtitles--very distracting--which is why I didn't give the film five stars.

"Lola" is a lot of fun, and intriguing double-helixed threaded relationships. I had a chance to view both DVDs on the market now. Lola from Mr. Bongo in the UK [Lola: Mr Bongo Films], which I own, tends to be available at less cost. But this reviewed Lola, from Wellspring / FoxLorber in the US, has light extras. Bongo's Lola is coded for Region 9, which is an all-region world-wide. In New York I play it on my TV, my computer and my portable with no problem. Wellspring's Lola is Region 1 [US/Canada].

Both Lolas are taken from the 2000 restoration supervised by Jacques Demy's widow, filmmaker Agnès Varda. Bongo's Lola's subtitles are in large white type; Wellspring's are in bold yellow, and so easier to see. This Lola has no extras; Wellspring's has a clip, about ten minutes, from Agnes Varda's 2003 film The World of Jacques Demy, and also a 1961 trailer of Lola. The primary weblink included with Wellspring's is to an article on Demy in the magazine Senses of Cinema com. The link is now out of date yet it may have been to a nice Lola appreciation by Darragh O'Donoghue in Issue 54, but likely was to a good essay on Demy by Caroline E. Layde from Issue 26.

As an afternote, I've never found Anouk Aimee to be sensual and especially so in what passes for sexy in the 1960's, but here she is incredibly sensuous, and Lola is indeed compelling.