L'alliance

Christian de Chalonge works mainly in TV now, but his few films showed a great imagination. Who can forget Docteur Petiot, the mad doctor of Vichy France who killed Jews trying to escape the trains bound for death camps? Just the musical score--that saw--was enough to make me doubt my sanity. L'Alliance is a beautiful fantasy film that should really be reissued on DVD.

Anna Karina is a newly-wed wealthy woman who finds her husband is spying on her, following her around on shopping trips. That he is a veterinarian who is slowly building a zoo in her lovely house is also ample cause for concern. Her curiosity--and mounting suspicion of his motives--one day lead her to open a box, allowing a snake to escape. The parallel with Adam and Eve is gracefully worked out. This film is full of lovely details: the women who bring their weird pets to the vet look pretty strange themselves; the vet has a melancholic expression that never changes, it's as though he has taken on the personality of one of the animals. I was more impressed with this one than with effects-ridden films like Jurassic Park or The Island of Dr Moreau.

Very strange but good looking film from little known director, Christian de Challonges which was a pretty ambitious project to take on but these were strange times in cinema, especially French cinema. Jean-Claude Carriere stars but also wrote the screenplay which is based upon his own novel. Indeed he was better known as writer and veteran of very many screenplays including several for Luis Bunuel and some of those he also appeared. Anna Karina, best known for her work with Goddard, is wonderful here, radiant throughout. Carriere is also most effective as the obsessive veterinary surgeon and if he seems to only have one expression it is a worrying one. Creepy and worrying is the name of the game here as the couple's Parisian is gradually filled with animals and insects as the two humans become more and more suspicious of each other. Ultimately unsatisfying, the film is nevertheless compelling and well worth a watch.

This is a fantasy film that should not be missed.Rarely shown on the screens,it's almost forgotten ,even by French fantasy buffs.Christian de Challonges creates an unsettling scary atmosphere without using one single special effect.The animals,omnipresent ,seem to watch the human,and to understand what eludes them.

Sometimes it evokes Roman Polanski's early style,but without the Pole director's favorite camera tricks .This is a movie so rich it can be interpreted in different ways.I will suggest mine:this might be a Garden of Eden parable,and the two heroes would be modern Adam and Eve.A lot of clues are in full agreement with that:"Are the insects watching us?Karina says.I feel someone mighty watch us as if we were insects";the man ,who seems afraid of the woman,the marriage is consummated only at the end of the movie,after the woman has released..the snake;the ending which is completely unexpected and becomes a metaphor of the fall after the original sin.

Challonges describes a world apparently normal,but he introduces unusual elements little by little.The man's clients (he's a vet) are offbeat ,their pets are more and more weird .Besides,Anna Karina's strange beauty enhances the mystery .An impending menace is hanging over the fragile human race.A visitor says:" it wouldn't take much to eliminate the human being on this planet".

This must be a hard-to-find movie,but if you can find it and you like the fantasy genre,this is an unqualified must.We're closer to "twelve monkeys" than "un peu de soleil dans l'eau froide" (I would not recommend the latter).

Definitely an interesting fantastic movie , worth watching,but nobody says anything about the end , which is kind of at your own appreciation.I don't wanna say more. Just watch it ! Anna Karina is great ,but also Jean-Claude Carriere is doing a good job .I don't know but it's the first time I heard of a novelist playing in an adaptation of his own book . Interesting ,no ? What I like also about the movie is also that is original , can't be compared to any other movie . It's not only about a devoted veterinarian and scientist but also about his marriage with a mysterious woman . Basically they are 2 characters : HIM and HER , they met by an agency , they wed , so far nothing special but there's suspense , and mystery in the air especially her trips where she ...buys nothing.On the other side him is turning the huge bourgeois apartment into a zoo , interested in extrasensory perceptions of the various animals he's collecting.What do you think , somebody (lover ?) resided in that apartment before ? Before him.