An (inflatable) evening with Christophe Bier
Feverishly flipping through the catalog, you search for your favorite rendez-vous. Fret no more, you’re on the right page. They will be here again this year! With this double bill hosted by Master Bier and his disciple Perret, with two rare and precious films. Two French movies (or Franco-Spanish, but no bickering, please) released a few months apart in 1974, and that feature an inflatable doll as their main character. Lars and the real girl by Craig Gillespie, Monique by Valérie Guignabodet, or Air Doll by Hirokazu Koreeda: this “obscure object of desire” has often inspired filmmakers, more or less successfully. Here the directors use absurdity to subvert the transgressive aura of these humanoid dolls, to better shed a light on their protagonists' deep loneliness. One small note: if you plan to bring your own doll, she’ll have to buy a ticket like everyone else.
La Grande Paulette
Gérald Calderon
- 1974
- France
- Drama comedy
- 1h30mn
- French
- Color
Exclusive integral cut
Out of boredom, a couple adopts an inflatable doll and decides to take it on a “family vacation” for the summer.
Difficult to describe this Grand Paulette, one of the definitive oddities in the Gaumont catalog. Gérald Calderon’s sole fiction film (he will switch to documentaries with more success), this loony production is a total mystery. Halfway between Jean-Pierre Mocky (the presence of Michael Lonsdale, Calderon’s half-brother among the cast, reinforcing the lineage) and Michel Gondry, the film is a fascinating happening, where each sequence seems imagined to push the madness even further. Nothing compares to La Grande Paulette and La Grande Paulette compares to nothing. One of this edition's craziest films!
Credits
- With : Michael Lonsdale, Catherine Samie, Didier Kaminka, Nicole Jamet, Yves Barsacq...
- Screenplay : Gérald Calderon, Didier Kaminka
- Photography : Pierre Guéguen
- Music by : Georges Prost
- Production : Yves Robert, Danièle Delorme, Alain Poiré
Life Size
(Grandeur nature)
Luis García Berlanga
- 1974
- France, Spain, Italia
- Drama comedy
- 1h41mn
- Original version with French subtitles
- Color
Michel, a prominent dentist, receives his inflatable doll: He’s rejuvenated, to his entourage’s great surprise, as they have a hard time understanding the presence of this new “woman” in his life…
The career of Spaniard Luis García Berlanga (The Executioner) has too often been overlooked, left out of cinema anthologies, cinephile discussions or festivals… except at L’Étrange, that this year presents one of his more insane and mysterious creations, carried by Piccoli (who that same year, (hats off!), acted in Ferreri’s Don't Touch the White Woman, Francis Girod’s The Infernal Trio, Luis Buñuel’s The Phantom of Liberty and Vincent, François, Paul... and the Others by Claude Sautet) in a perfect composition tainted with demented melancholy - or a melancholic dementia. The doll was created by Alexandre Trauner (Children of Paradise), with screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière (Max Mon Amour, The Pact) adding his surrealist touch to this forgotten cinema gem.
Credits
- With : Michel Piccoli, Valentine Tessier, Rada Rassimov, Claudia Blanchi, Queta Claver...
- Screenplay : Luis García Berlanga, Rafael Azcona, Jean-Claude Carrière
- Photography : Alain Derobe
- Editing : Françoise Bonnot
- Music by : Maurice Jarre
- Production : Christian Ferry, Alfredo Matas
