1998 - AUTUMN TALE, Rohmer's take on middle age love

A film so light as a feather it could blow away if it were not made by one filmmaker, Eric Rohmer.  The last of Rohmer's group of films called  the "Tales of the Four Seasons, " an Autumn Tale is a serene love story.  Many of Rohmer's films are about young people falling in and out of love.  The spin in this film is that it focuses on a group of middle aged people. 

Rosine and Isabelle are the friends of a winemaker named Maxine.  Maxine is lonely so her two friends decide to play matchmakers and set her up with someone she can start a relationship with.  Rosine through the want ads finds a man named Gerald who she thinks would be good boyfriend material.  Isabelle also zeros in on one of her old college professors Etienne who as it turns out is only interested in relationships with younger women.  With all Rohmer films complications arise as everyone sorts out what is going on and who is interested in who.

 

By this point in his career Rohmer was an old pro at telling this type of story.  His storytelling style was never flashy and he tended to get his plot points across with his actors and his dialog instead of lots of fancy photography and editing.

 

Autumn Tale is set in the Rhone Valley near the Swiss Alps I believe.  The scenery in the small towns and vineyards in this area is gorgeous. This is a smoothly made and very enjoyable film from the master storyteller.

 As usual Rohmer wrote the film.  The running time is 112 minutes. 

1995 - RENDEVOUS IN PARIS, aka Les Rendez-vous de Paris

 The brief description for this film was, " the film consists of three loosely connected episodes revolving around chance meetings in Paris," this was not a selling point for me.  As a film critic whose name escapes me once wrote.  "Love stories are easy to make, it's just two people saying a lot of dumb things to each other.

However in this case I shouldn't have been worried.  The writer/director is Eric Rohmer and if there is anyone who knows how to write love stories about young French people it's Rohmer.

 

The film consists of three separate stories. In the first story a student figures out that her boyfriend is cheating on her.  In the second story, a couple meet and talk about their relationship while wandering around a lot of beautiful parks.  Sort of a mini tour of Paris.  The third story is about an artist trying to pick up a woman at a museum who apparently was just recently married.

 

As with many of Rohmer's films the women are young, beautiful and smart.  Their boyfriends are all for the most part kind of clueless and stupid.

A very enjoyable and civilized film from a master filmmaker.

The running time is 94 minutes.

1983 - PAULINE AT THE BEACH, the 3rd film in Rohmer's Comedies and Proverbs series.

Another Eric Rohmer talk fest but the talk is good.  Pauline and her cousin Marion are vacationing off of the coast of France.  Here they meet several men who they fall in and out of love with throughout the film.

This is a typical well thought out Rohmer film,  The women are beautiful, the men are kind of stupid, the scenery is nice and the dialog and situations are rather clever.

As usual the cast responds well to Rohmer's screenplay which believe is a real yak fest. 

Rohmer wrote the film,  Néstor Almendros did his usual good job with the cinematography.  The film runs 94 minutes