La femme et le pantin

Lively but stupid French-Italian co-production in French and Spanish has a wealthy gentleman in Spain possibly looking for a mistress after his wife becomes paralyzed, but getting more than he bargained for after falling madly in love with a shapely village girl who treats him indifferently. Story of a woman's power over a smitten man is an unhappy venture from start to finish. Bardot, freed from her marriage to Roger Vadim by this point, seems to be repeating herself (she dances a fiery Flamenco and gets to show off her ample figure, and that's about it). Spotty adaptation of Pierre Louÿs's novel (previously filmed in 1935 with Marlene Dietrich as "The Devil is a Woman" and reworked in 1977 as "That Obscure Object of Desire") has been left stretched and beleaguered by its four screenwriters, including director Julien Duvivier, with whom Bardot had an unhappy working relationship. * from ****

"La femme et le pantin" is the most distressingly mediocre Duvivier film.It was absolutely bland ,not even distinguished by the professionalism that came to stamp his later work.It was exactly his professionalism that provoked the derision of the young Turks of the Nouvelle Vague for whom "carrying on the tradition" was not the road to follow.But when even professionalism is in question,what can be saved?

"La femme et le pantin" found the director lost in the folklore for tourists and hiding behind Brigitte Bardot's sensual body.BB is the only thing worthwhile in the whole movie.She is probably the ideal actress cast in the wrong movie.She is sadly unsupported by a very poor cast:her lover is not even handsome ,her father acts like a zombie and her mother's overplaying is thoroughly unbearable.

This is the third version of Pierre Louïs's novel;for the record,there was also De Baroncelli's (France,1928) ,Von Sternberg's ("The Devil is a Woman" ,US,1935) and Luis Bunuel 's( "Cet Obscur Objet du Desir" France,1977)

Do not get me wrong:I am a big Duvivier fan and I have written more comments on his films than on any other director 's works.This is the only one of which I cannot say something nice.

Considering that Bardot is one of the most if not THE most beautiful woman ever filmed it's just plain distressing how many of her films like this one are not clear like modern movies are that feature less beautiful er "stars" like Adam Sandler. If only the films had been filmed as clearly as the many still photos of her from the same time that leave no doubt to her incredible beauty.

Brigitte Bardot's beauty is all there is in this otherwise weak 1958 Julien Duvivier film. The story is trite, and the portrayal of Spaniards (it is set in Sevilla) is almost comically cliched: the men are macho, mustached, womanizing bullfighters, the women are sultry, carefree dancers. The film does at least offer the pleasure of listening to two of the most beautiful languages in the world (French and Spanish) in the same picture, but, frankly, I was feeling the urge to turn it off after about only thirty minutes. Which maybe I should have done, because the ending is deplorable. * out of 4.