A Man and a Woman [1967] (REGION 1) (NTSC)

Amazon.co.uk Review

French film-maker Claude Lelouch continues to take critical heat for this 1966 international hit, which has been labelled "schmaltzy" and dismissed as overly stylised for its simple story line. While it certainly can't be mistaken for a masterpiece of the French New Wave (Lelouch was left in the dust that year by such wonders as Jean-Luc Godard's Masculin Feminin), A Man and a Woman has a jumpy impressionism that engages a viewer precisely because it cuts against conventional expectations of romance. Starring Anouk Aimée as a widowed "script girl" (working in film production) and Jean-Louis Trintignant as a racer who lost his wife to suicide, the film is really an objective sampling--almost a study--of moments between the time the two characters meet and the point at which they begin to read each other intuitively. Generous flashbacks fill in details on the pair's woeful, recent histories, while endless documentary-like glimpses of Aimée's and Trintignant's characters at work in their highly charged professions become a visual engine for the days passing between measured developments in love. Lelouch is more drily humane than lush in his approach, though the film strains once in a while for a forced naturalism that can actually be more narcissistic than the most obvious romantic contrivance. Still, A Man and a Woman--in the best sense--is also a movie in love with itself, with its own ability to evoke and conjure and construct dozens of different ways of tracking a relationship in progress. If Lelouch doesn't exactly push open the boundaries of cinema as several of his film-making peers did at the time, he certainly enjoys what he's doing. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com

Customer Reviews:

Slight but very memorable.......2007-12-05

It's not surprising that Un Homme et Une Femme/A Man and a Woman proved a smash hit: cars and stunts for the guys and romance for the gals, an impossible to forget love theme and a slight enough plot not to get in the way of the characters or be damaged by subtitling or dubbing. Rather than a love story it's really the prelude to a love story - or at least a possible love story (an ambiguity the belated sequel would find few friends by resolving) - with the mutually widowed Jean-Louis Trintignant's racing driver and Anouk Aimée's continuity girl still in love with her dead husband meeting through their weekend trips to visit their children in boarding school. It's a fitting start to their romance since the film was born when director Claude Lelouch, after driving all night trying to work out how to save his disastrous Les Grands Moments, found himself on a beach at six in the morning watching a woman with her child presumably making the most of what little time they had together. Shot on the hoof with a tiny crew with exteriors shot in color to raise funding for a TV sale but the interiors shot in black and white to keep costs down, the film still works surprisingly well, striking just enough home truths about relationships and doing it with enough charm and skill to make the odd misstep forgivable, although if you've seen the sly opening scenes of Lelouch's La Bonne Annee you might find it extremely difficult to keep a straight face during the ending.

Both this and the sequel, A Man and a Woman 20 Years Later, are currently available at a bargain price on a nice PAL 3-disc set with English subtitles from Amazon.fr (the third disc of extras has no subtitles, however).

Perfect.......2004-03-16

A beautiful film with a beautiful musical score that's so evocative of France in the 1960s. First time around it DID inspire me to move to Paris and it hasn't lost any of its magic for me today. I just wish that they'd release a CD with the original score - my old vinyl LP is a bit scratchy now.

A classic arthouse movie.......2000-12-29

A Man and a Woman is French "subtitle" film at its best. In a style that is now regularly parodied by perfume adverts and French & Saunders, the film is a combination of long dialogues, lingering camera shots, sports cars, smoking, colour and black and white shots and samba music. The main characters are beautiful just to look at, while the French language sounds beautifully romantic in comparison to English flirtation. Anouk Aimee went on to marry Albert Finney. The film is both passionate and engaging while not being cheesey or intense. It is enough to inspire someone to move abroad and fall in love!

Sophisicated, wonderfully scored and beautifully filmed........2000-05-03

In Claude Lelouche's genre defining movie, un homme meets une femme and love conspires but not without some unexpected yet touching complications. Sensitively put together with a tenderness which is close to reality, this is a wonderful movie, which has become one of my all time favourites. Sad, happy, fast slow, the pace keeps changing but you'll never lose interest.

One of the best films ever - legendary and rightly.......2000-03-18

This is absolutely one of my most favourite films - moving, romantic, amusing, bitter-sweet, heartwarming. The two stars are very attractive which makes it even better. Entertaining subplot of motor-racing which amazingly fits in perfectly with the romance. Gorgeous from start to finish and you hardly notice it isn't in colour.

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