A Man and a Woman [Un homme et une femme] **** (1966, Anouk Aimée, Jean-Louis Trintignant) – Classic Movie Review 7,925

Director Claude Lelouch’s 1966 A Man and a Woman [Un Homme et une Femme] is the quintessential French Sixties chocolate box movie, starring Anouk Aimée and Jean-Louis Trintignant as screenwriter Anne Gauthier (Aimée) and sports-car driver Jean-Louis Duroc (Trintignant), who find themselves falling in love in Deauville, northern France, to the irrepressibly catchy kitsch strains of Francis Lai (da ba, da ba, da…).

Both of them have kids from deceased previous partners and they have come to meet them at a seaside school. But the widow and a widower find their new relationship develops into love, though they are haunted by their past tragedies.

Intellectual critics were aghast, especially French intellectual critics, but Claude Lelouch’s movie has Gallic charm and chic in bucketfuls, and in its Sixties newspaper colour supplement way it works winningly.

A Man and a Woman [Un Homme et une Femme] is the winner of Oscars for the Best Foreign Language Film and Best Original Story and Screenplay in 1966, but the much loved score did not even get a nomination. It won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1966, tied with The Birds, the Bees and the Italians. Anouk Aimée won the Bafta award for Best Foreign Actress.

It is written by Claude Lelouch (screenplay/story) and Pierre Uytterhoeven (screenplay), shot by Claude Lelouch and produced by Claude Lelouch.

Also in the cast are Pierre Barouh, Valerie Lagrange, Simone Paris and Henri Chemin.

It was re-released in 1999, and it has kept its French Sixties charm.

Aimée reunited with Lelouch and Trintignant for a sequel, A Man and a Woman: 20 Years Later [Un homme et une femme, 20 ans deja] (1986).

And they reunited a third and final time for a follow-up, The Best Years of a Life [Les plus belles années d’une vie] (2019), which is Aimée’s final film.

Claude Lelouch (born 30 October 1937).

Jean-Louis Trintignant (11 December 1930 – 17 June 2022) was one of the most gifted French dramatic actors of the post-war era.

Anouk Aimée (born Nicole Françoise Florence Dreyfus) (27 April 1932 – 18 June 2024) appeared in 70 films from 1947 to 2019.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7,925

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