Falbalas

The first of Jacques Becker's films to bear the credit "Un film de Jacques Becker", thus attesting to his growing stature within the industry.

Having essayed a French equivalent of 'Cold Comfort Farm' during the Occupation with 'Goupi Mains Rouges', Becker next made a characteristic about turn to provide a bit of glossy escapism shot before the Liberation but released in 1945 with this hothouse drama set within the frivolous and insulated world of Parisian haute couture. Christian Dior's 'New Look' being still two years away, the woman all wear wartime padded suits and terrifying frizzy big hair, through the midst of which struts the fox in this henhouse, designer Raymond Rouleau, who exercises droit du seigneur with a new model played by a baby-faced Micheline Presle before he comes a spectacular cropper when he becomes genuinely besotted with her.