Adorable menteuse (1962)
Directed by Michel Deville

Film Review

After the success of their first collaboration, Ce soir ou jamais (1961), director Michel Deville and screenwriter Nina Companeez went on to make a number of other light romantic comedies that found similar favour with French cinema audiences.  Adorable menteuse is one of the most charming comedies this formidable duo came up with, a gentle comedy of manners that appears superficial but actually has more to it than first meets the eye, and there is just a suggestion of the darker turn that Deville's subsequent oeuvre would take.  Marina Vlady and Macha Méril are a delight to watch as the two principals, a perfect contrast that makes the most of Companeez's gently mischievous screenplay.  Deville is clearly still learning his trade, so the mise-en-scène has none of the sophistication that we find in his later work, but the film's lack of pretence makes it a welcome change from the French New Wave offerings that were being foisted on audiences around this time.

Film Synopsis

Adorable liar... what better way to describe Juliette, the cute little charmer who just cannot help lying to everyone, even her sister Sophie.  Lying to men is all part of her technique of seduction, and men are so gullible, so easily deceived that Juliette scarcely knows she is lying half of the time.  It is a mystery to her how Sophie can bear to be so honest, especially when it is her candour that always gets her into trouble.  Far better to be a deceiver, to play the game of love as it is supposed to be played, with charm and guile.  At least, that is what Juliette used to think.  Now she has come round to a different view.  Lying has begun to bore her.  When you play the same game over and over again, in exactly the same way, you are bound to get bored with it.  Juliette now longs to play a new game, but no one will let her.  Her reputation as a deceiver sticks to her like an old petticoat that is glued to her skin.  This discovery torments her, because she has found a man, a nice 40-something lawyer named Antoine, with whom she wants to play a different game.  For the first time in her life Juliette really does think she is in love, but how can she convince Antoine of this when he knows he can never believe a word that she says...?