Conte d'hiver

A most brilliant, brilliant movie. Rohmer here exhibits nothing but true mastery in this most insightful work on the power of love over all else. This is a movie for romantics, dreamers and those who have known what it is to live for love.

Being "a Rohmer", the movie is by no means fast paced but as each minute passes you lose track of time as you become ever more consumed in the story; and it's a story whose tension almost effortlessly builds as the movie progresses; fulfilled in part by Rohmer's brilliant direction but also by the exceptional performance of Charlotte Very. Her acting in this movie is so brilliant that it's sometimes difficult to recall that you are actually watching a fictional movie and not a fly on the wall treatise on the nature of love that never dies. The question one must repeatedly wonder concerns the nature of love and more particularly whether one can ever love other persons the same way you loved your first? Whether your views change or not from watching this movie, it would be difficult not to be moved by its tale. All I can say is that by the film's ending I really was hungry for more - which rarely happens to me when watching movies! That being said, this is definitely not a movie for everyone: If your "top ten" includes Transformers, 300, Fight Club then you should steer well clear of Conte D'Hiver. The action in this movie is only of the psychological sort. Rohmer fans will (needless to say) be instant converts. But if you enjoyed movies as diverse as Before Sunrise, or even Casablanca you'll certainly not want to miss Conte D'Hiver/A Winter's Tale. Without a moment's hesitation, I give it 9/10. And so should you! Please watch it & see why...

As he grew older it seemed veteran screen-writer and director Eric Rohmer grew a little more romantic and a little less cynical of life and love. His most famous work, the "Six Moral Tales" of the late 60s are expose's of human failings, pomposity and self obsession. Most of the characters are deeply flawed and many, though fascinating in their way, are distinctly hard to like or forgive. In the "Proverbs & Comedies" series of the 80s , the tales of life are a little softer, lighter, the characters more sympathetic and once the 1990's arrive and Rohmer's new "Four Seasons" series finds it feet, that trend has developed further.

The FOUR SEASONS stories carry a little more plot and rely less on the fairly heavy philosophy and religious conviction one would have encountered in MY NIGHT AT MAUD'S for example. There is hope where there had been despair.

CONTE D'HIVER is a bitter sweet tale of pretty young hairdresser Felicie and the aftermath of a brief passionate affair with the charming Charles. The result is that she bears his daughter but accidentally loses contact with him before he is aware of this. Life for Filicie is then a matter of putting up with a string of second-best lovers in the vain hope that Charles will somehow re- establish contact.

The action flits between Paris and provincial Nevers and as always the people the dialogue and the direction are wonderfully natural. The cinematography and editing are spare and unobtrusive and the acting is superb. There is one sequence, a lengthy scene in which Felicie watches , and is moved by, a stage production of a Shakespeare play that drags on far to long but otherwise this films almost skips along compared to some of the directors previous works, where the pace is always very measured and very slow. In all, a delightful film with a good cast headed by the attractive Charlotte Very, one of several excellent young actresses Rohmer cast around this time (Amanda Langlet and Emanuelle Chaulet being the others that spring to mind). Recommended

Second chapter of Rohmer's Tales Of The Four Seasons (before filming Winter's Tale he made Spring's Tale). This time the french director tells us the story of Felice, a girl in the search of her soul mate. Actually she had found him in some holidays, his name was Charles, and she got pregnant, but at the end of that summer of joy and love she gave him a wrong address... so she never saw his love again and couldn't locate him either. Five years after she's living in Paris, at her mother's house, with her daughter and she's going out with two different men, although she's not in love with none of'em. She can't love anyone but Charles. Will she ever find the lost love of her life? Does she believe in miracles? That's something we'll find out as we watch this Rohmer's film.

Gene Hackman said in some movie that "watching a Rohmer's movie is just like watching a plant grow". Obviously that'll be the opinion of most of the people (especially those who enjoy themselves watching Steven Seagal or Van Damme's movies); but there's something else in cinema (and in life) as well as kicks, guns, explosions, and parties. What about feelings, reflexions, love, doubts, philosophy? That's what Eric Rohmer seems to care about, and that's what he usually talks about in his movies. Ordinary people, living ordinary lives, with their ordinary problems, and their ordinary conflicts. In some way he's such a "voyeur": he puts his camera in some corner of the room and lets the characters express themselves. How they feel, what do they expect from life, what are their dreams, their fears... I think that's why he usually works with unknown actors and actresses: that way the audience feels like they're watching a completely unknown talking or crying, or laughing. I would not work the same if he picked Gerard Depardieu or Juliette Binoche for this sort of movies. Also he uses a literary language in the dialogues (dialogues, the base of Rohmer's cinematography), though his movies show ordinary situations the people in there definitely doesn't talk like normal people. Some may say that's a handicap, that people doesn't talk about existence and the meaning of life when they're having a coffee in some coffee-shop; but when I want to hear real-life dialogues with real-life sentences, rough language, and so I just go and watch some Tarantino movie.

I wouldn't recommend Rohmer's movies to anyone; 'cause I assume that movies such as Winter's Tale may result boring for many people. So I only recommend this movie (and the rest of Tales of the Four Seasons) to those who look for something else in cinema and (again) in life apart from hollow entertainment.

My Rate: 8/10

The second of Eric Rohmer's Four Seasons. This is a beautiful movie. Low-keyed, quite, slow- but not at all too slow. Simple story with complex characters; Interesting to the end. I can't wait to see the other "seasons".

Felicie (Charlotte Véry), another of Eric Rohmer's attractive, smart, but terminally indecisive women is still feeling the effects of the abrupt end to her summer romance five years ago. Having mistakenly given her lover Charles (Frédéric van den Driessche) the wrong address as he was leaving for the U.S., she cannot really love other men and holds onto a strong belief that Charles will one day show up and all will be right with the world. Eric Rohmer's second film in his Four Seasons series, A Tale of Winter, is one of his most engaging romances, a film that like the Shakespeare play of the same name, postulates that passion and strong intention can lead to totally unexpected results.

The opening sequence shows Charles and Felicie enjoying the sun, making love, then parting at the end of their vacation. The scene then shifts to Christmas in Paris five years later. Elise (Ava Lorachi), the daughter she had with Charles is now four years old and has seen her father only through photos. Felicie has two lovers but none suit her. Maxence (Michael Voletti) is a heavy set, not too deep hairdresser who is moving from Paris to Nevers and wants Felicie to come with him. She loves being with him but is not madly in love with him. After first saying no, she agrees to go to Nevers but once there, has yet another change of heart after an epiphany about Charles during a visit to a cathedral and returns to her mother in Paris.

Felicie's other suitor, Loic (Hervé Furic), is a bookish librarian who is obviously crazy about her but whom she just wants as a friend. He is a Catholic intellectual and Felicie is more free-spirited and they engage in typical Rohmerian exchanges about Christianity, reincarnation and the nature of the soul. A new awareness opens up when she visits the theater with Loic to see Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale. When she sees King Leontes bring a statue of his wife to life after being told, ''It is required that you do awake your faith'', her own ability to "awake her faith" is evoked and leads to one of Rohmer's more upbeat and satisfying conclusions.