Un autre homme, une autre chance

Frenchman and his wife come to Old West America circa 1870 in search of new lives for themselves, but he is soon killed and she becomes acquainted with a shy, gentle widower. US-French co-production from writer-director Claude Lelouch, who has keen eyes and stirs up an appropriately dusty, windswept scenario. Unfortunately, the film (in English, French and Spanish) is lumbering and overlong at 130mns. The casting of James Caan and Genevieve Bujold seems promising at the outset, but their characters generate little interest. Fascinatingly detailed, however, with beautiful cinematography by Stanley Cortez and Jacques Lefrançois, but a narrative that might've stood some tightening. ** from ****

Photographer Francis Huster convinces Genevieve Bujold to abandon their native Paris and make a new life in the American west. They get married on the wagon train and settle in a small but growing city; he is shot because of his incessant picture taking. Meanwhile, veterinarian James Caan has a nagging wife, who wants they to move from their ranch. She dies in childbirth.

Director Claude Lelouch is the most unabashedly romantic director since Frank Borzage. As a result, you keep wondering when Caan and Mlle Bujold are going to stop mourning and start living again. There's no sign of the ineluctable workings of fate here, just the chance of a rebirth in the New World, with Caan at his most masculine, and Mlle Bujold indescribably cute.

Veteran cinematographer Stanley Cortez has his last credit here, capturing, along with Jacques Lefrancois, Lelouch's wide-eyed view of the beauties and weirdnesses of the Old West.

This is not a western, this is a dramatic love story set in the Old West. If you think Sergio Leone's "Once Upon A Time In The West" is slow and artsy you won't enjoy this film because it is even slower and more artistic. Good performances by Caan and Bujold can't help speed the pace of this drawn out love story. The only action takes place in the first 20 minutes of the film. The rest is pure love story which is okay but we've seen it all before in Lelouch's "A Man and a Woman."

Interesting to read some other reviews here talk of how art plays a role in this film, and how that's a bad or somehow less appealing thing. Maybe it's the genre they see as this not working well. For some, a simpler film may be best. But this film integrates a variety of story lines and looks to take the viewer on a forward and backward ride forcing you to think about what you missed and what is yet to come. With that, it's too complicated, too artsy if you will, for a dumbed down less sophisticated American movie audience. Sad that some miss this, but see the film for yourself and appreciate film making for the art IT IS!!! American film audiences have a lot of work to do! Otherwise, I love the film for the French language and story line in Paris because I love French, France, and Paris!

This was not a stellar film, but life and films aren't always galactic experiences. If you want to go back and spend some light time in the 19th century American West and France this is a nice bit of time travel. I'm confused by the opening scene because it stands all alone and is never resolved. I would have expected a flash of light and a trip though a worm hole and an eventual return to modern times. But that would have been a different story, I suppose. Once back in time the story, ambiance, characters and storytelling style kept my attention nicely. Of course, I'm a fan of James Caan, and the chemistry between him and Geneviève Bujold was very touching and not overdone. In fact, nothing was overdone. It's just a good, understated love story.