Part of Musical Matinees
Friday, July 9, 2021, 3:00 p.m.
Museum of the Moving Image - Redstone Theater

Dir. Jacques Demy. 1967. 126 mins. DCP. With Catherine Deneuve, Françoise Dorléac, George Chakiris, Michel Piccoli, Jacques Perrin, Gene Kelly, Danielle Darrieux. This bountiful cinematic confection from the great Jacques Demy (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg) marries the irrepressible optimism of the American musical with the youthful yearning of the French New Wave in an open-air tour de force of romantic missed connections and suspended reunions. When a traveling fair comes to their sleepy seaside town, twin sisters Delphine and Solange (real-life siblings Deneuve and Dorléac) find their dreams of love and adventure bursting onto the streets in one elaborate song and dance sequence after another. Demy’s film is a sublime synthesis of the western musical genre up to its moment, shot entirely on location in cinemascope by the great Ghislain Cloquet (Au Hasard Balthazar) and featuring a legendary, jazz-inflected score by Michel Legrand.