L’Adolescente (1979) - film review

In the summer of 1939, on the eve of World War II, 13 year old Marie and her parents leave Paris to spend a holiday with her grandmother in a small provincial town.  Overhearing frank discussion of sexual matters between the locals, Marie begins to discover her own womanhood and starts to develop a crush on the local doctor, who is nearly 20 years her senior.  Then her father appears to walk out on her mother…

Having established herself in the 1960s as one of France’s greatest actresses, Jeanne Moreau turned her talents to film making in the 1970s, where she directed two films.  This, her second film, is an uncompromising and somewhat nostalgic look at sexual awakening in a young girl, set in the beautiful locale of the French provincial countryside.

Whilst visually the film is impressive, and we are treated to a fine performance from another former acting legend, Simone Signoret, the film does lack depth and intimacy.  The latter half of the film when the young Marie becomes envious of her mother and conspires to rekindle the passion between her parents has some touching moments but feels cold and contrived.

Whilst not quite so impressive as Moreau’s first film as a director (Lumière ), this film has some merits, not least of which is that it presents a refreshingly honest examination of female adolescence.

© James Travers 2001

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I saw this film in 1982 and have kept it in mind ever since. It’s such a true, simple story of a young girl’s coming of age in pre-WWII rural France, and of the lives of her mother, father, and grandmother one summer. It should be more readily available than it is. I can’t find it! How happy I am to learn that Jeanne Moreau was the director.
Margaret Brittingham (Phoenix, Arizona) 

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