Nelly et Mr. Arnaud

What a beautiful, tender film...melancholy in tone, with an underlying sense of passion! I was so moved by it I was inspired to write a poem . There might be those (militant feminists, perhaps) who would object to the theme of an older man yearning (but discreetly) for a beautiful much younger woman...but I found it not only true to life, but humanly evocative. What a genius for film-making...Claude Sautet..("Un Coeur En Hiver" his masterpiece, in my opinion). He will be sadly missed. Thank you and farewell, M.Sautet.

I came across this film, purely by chance, when it was shown on terrestrial TV a couple of years ago. It's a beautiful study of a complex relationship between an older man - the urbane, world-weary Monsieur Arnaud (Michel Serrault) - and the beautiful young woman (Emmanuelle Béart) he hires to assist him in the writing of his memoirs. Initially, they are dependent on each other for different reasons - Nelly financially and Arnaud on the direction Nelly brings to his work - but as the film progresses they become more emotionally attached and the implications of this is the film's main theme. The depth of feeling that develops between the two characters comes across very strongly, thanks mainly to the quality of the two lead performances, while the sexual aspect is merely hinted at and is all the more erotic for it. If subtlety and suggestion are what you look for in a film, "Nelly and Monsieur Arnaud" should be high on your list of 'must see' movies.

Michel Serrault, of whom I have the highest regard for his great talent, hits yet another home run with this role. He portrays a wealthy widower, who per chance, meets a sweet young woman, many years his junior. Nellie needs a job and Mr. Arnaud needs an editor. The wonderful friendship that these two engage in, is so sweet and affecting; it'll remind even the most independent person that friends are as real and precious as gold. Mr. Serrault's character has a humor drier than sherry. A very good film.

When you gotta go you gotta go and if Claude Sautet had to go he certainly went in style. He gave us some of the finest and most durable films in late 20th century French cinema - Vincent, Francois, Paul et les Autres, En Cour en Hiver and so many more, films we can watch again and again with renewed pleasure and he signed off with a doozy. It is, of course, a cliché that only the French know how to handle the man-woman relationship in all its nuances, unorthodoxy, etc, but one worth repeating. Its all too easy to imagine the clumsiness with which modern English/US directors would have handled the older man/younger woman situation that lies at the heart of this story but I'm ready to bet plenty of twelve-to-seven that none would have brought the delicacy of touch, subtlety that is synonymous with Sautet. When we talk of a 'mood' piece we think of Chekhov and Sautet invokes the Russian master in spinning out of thin air a fragile, gossamer-thin tacit understanding between his two leads. Beart is almost too impossibly beautiful to be true and she needs to be the fine actress she is to get past the handicap of classical features while Serrault is a consummate actor still turning out great performances. A word too about the support, Michele Laroque, a stand-up comedienne in her spare time, brings the same solid support here as she did later in Francis Veber's 'Le Placard'. I can pay this movie no higher compliment than to bracket it with 'Brief Encounter', another masterpiece of unconsummated love that is still enchanting audiences fifty years on, as Nelly and Mr. Arnaud surely will be.

How many film-makers make their greatest masterpiece as their last film? Not many, but to that select list, add Claude Sautet. Nelly & M. Arnaud is exquisite.

It is cinema.

This is to say that, in common with most truly and unquestionably great films, it could not exist with such power in any other art. The most difficult and also the most wonderful films are the films that take place, primarily in their character's hearts. It was not important what Charles Foster Kane *did*, but what he felt. In this film too, we experience the primacy of human feelings.

We do this through two luminous performances that reveal just how coarse is the acting that we habitually see in block-buster movies. One of the many deep emotions that overcame me when I first saw this film was that sheer privilege to see such acting.

To see the very gradual, subtle and beautiful love that develops between the two central characters is to get a glimpse of heaven. A film, then, not of love, but the possibility of love, and a warning without didacticism that we all should grasp love if we are given the opportunity.

Perhaps the greatest joy of cinema is its ability to allow us to experience rare emotion. This wonderful, wonderful film does that in an effortless way, without sentimentality, and for that we should be eternally grateful. Thank you M. Sautet, wherever you may be.