French film photo galley for 1960

French films of the 1960s

La Piscine (1969)

A former real-life couple Alain Delon and Romy Schneider are re-united on screen in this compelling psychological drama, one of Jacques Deray’s best-known films. The film revolves around a dangerous love triangle, with virtually all of the action taking place either in or by an outdoor swimming pool in a villa. Whilst the plot is somewhat thin... [More...]

La Sirène du Mississippi (1969)

The film in which French New Wave director François Truffaut shows most clearly his love of American pulp fiction and the suspense-thriller genre is very probably La Sirène du Mississippi. With its huge budget (8 million francs), exotic location (the island of Réunion) and big name billing (and you couldn’t get much bigger than Belmondo and Deneuve)... [More...]

La Femme infidèle (1969)

Few films exemplify Chabrol’s cinema better and more fully than La Femme infidèle . The bourgeois setting, the dangerously repressed characters, the mildly disturbing voyeuristic photography, the discordant music… all the familiar motifs which conspire to conjure up an unsettling world of seemingly middle-class respectability in which deadly passions are struggling to break... [More...]

La Fiancée du pirate (1969)

Argentinean born writer Nelly Kaplan won instant acclaim for this, a distinctly individual film which marked her directorial debut. Kaplan had previously worked with Abel Gance on his later films and had rubbed shoulders with the surrealist writer André Breton; both of these influences are noticeable in her own work... [More...]

Le Cerveau (1969)

After the immense success of Le Corniaud (1964) and La Grande vadrouille (1966) – two of the most popular films ever made in France – director Gérard Oury had great ambitions for his next film. With a colossal budget of 24 million francs, Le Cerveau was conceived as gutsy blockbuster parody of the American heist thriller... [More...]

Le Chagrin et la pitié (1969)

By any standards, Le Chagrin et la pitié is a monumental piece of film documentary. For one thing, it dares to make an objective assessment of one of the most difficult periods in France’s history – the German occupation of that country during World War II. In addition to being one of the most important documentaries ever made... [More...]

Le Clan des Siciliens (1969)

One of the most popular and best French crime thrillers of the 1960s, Le Clan des Siciliens brings together three giants of French cinema: Jean Gabin, Alain Delon and Lino Ventura. One of the main reasons for the film’s success is that the three lead actors brilliantly portray the kind of characters for which they are best known... [More...]

Le Gai savoir (1969)

The film that marked Jean-Luc Godard’s definitive break with mainstream cinema in the 1960s and defined his future direction for the next decade and beyond was this daring experimental work. Le Gai savoir was originally commissioned by the French television company ORTF as an adaptation of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s novel Emile... [More...]

Le Passager de la pluie (1969)

After the commercial failure of his big budget war-time drama Paris brûle-t-il? (1966), director René Clément returned to somewhat safer ground for his next film, the ever-popular psychological thriller. His previous forays into this genre – Plein soleil (1960) and Les Félins (1964) – were big successes and showed a genuine talent for suspense and... [More...]

Le Diable par la queue (1969)

Yves Montand shows great promise as a comic performer in this entertaining farce from Philippe de Broca. As is fairly typical of popular French comedies of this period, the film’s charm lies much more in the idiosyncratic performances of its stars than in its script or direction. Although Montand’s presence dominates the film... [More...]

Les Choses de la vie (1969)

Although the subject matter of this film is a tad on the soppy side for a quality French romantic drama, the way in which the film is shot and constructed manages to overcome this apparent flaw. If the film had been told is in a strictly linear way, it would probably have fallen flat and might resemble a rather cheap and tacky American tragic love story affair of the worst kind... [More...]

Ma nuit chez Maud (1969)

The third in Eric Rohmer’s series of six “contes moraux” (morality tales) explores the issue of freewill and the ability of one human being to choose his destiny in spite of competing external influences. This was Rohmer’s first truly successful film and established his international reputation as a director... [More...]

Mon oncle Benjamin (1969)

Jacques Brel clearly relishes his role as an amiable swashbuckling Don Juan in this entertaining historical farce and throws himself into the part body and soul. The film was directed by Edouard Molinaro, who would later work with Brel on another popular comedy, L’Emmerdeur (1973), before scoring a major hit with his cult film La Cage aux folles (1978)... [More...]

Monte Carlo or Bust (1969)

Monte Carlo or Bust was a spirited, but not altogether successful attempt, to repeat the success of Annakin’s 1965 film: Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines. This time, the chase is not between rickety aircraft, but involves vintage roadsters tearing across some of Europe’s most inhospitable terrain... [More...]

Que la bête meure (1969)

This compelling study of revenge and hate is easily one of Chabrol’s better films. Throughout, Chabrol is in perfect control of the drama and suspense, and the result is one of his darkest and most absorbing works. A film that is so firmly built around the viewpoint of its central character relies for its success on the performance of its lead actor... [More...]

Une femme douce (1969)

Robert Bresson’s first colour film sees a marked change in the director’s style from the cold austerity and intensity of his earlier works, such as Au hasard Balthazar (1966) and Mouchette (1967). Although the film deals with familiar Bresson themes of suicide and domestic repression, his approach in this film is far more accessible... [More...]

La Voie lactée (1969)

Often cited as Luis Buñuel’s most overtly religious works, La Voie lactée is certainly one of his most intellectually demanding and shamelessly irreverent. In common with his later satirical films, Buñuel combines a free-flowing narrative with surreal images and an acute Pythonesque comic slant... [More...]

Z (1969)

Winner of two oscars in 1969 (for best foreign picture, best editing) and awards at Cannes (the jury prize and best actor for Trintignant), Z is the film that took 1969 by storm. Even today, the film is still highly regarded and has much to appeal to a new generation of cinema-goers. On the surface, Z is a stunningly filmed political thriller... [More...]

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