Genre
The best French love stories
French cinema has a reputation for romance. These films earn it, and few of them end the way Hollywood would.
By Eleanor Hale
The reputation of French films for love stories is deserved, though not always in the way people expect. French romances are often more interested in desire, time and disappointment than in happy endings, and many of the best are sad. They are also among the most beautiful films ever made. Here are our favourites, in chronological order.
Romantic dramaL'AtalanteJean Vigo · 1934
Poetic realist dramaLe Quai des brumesMarcel Carné · 1938
Romantic dramaLes Enfants du paradisMarcel Carné · 1945
Romantic comedy-dramaLes Grandes ManœuvresRené Clair · 1955L'Atalante (Jean Vigo, 1934)
A young couple on a canal barge, separated and longing for each other. The underwater scene is unforgettable.
Le Quai des brumes (Marcel Carné, 1938)
A deserter and a girl in a beret fall in love in two days in the fog of Le Havre.
Les Enfants du paradis (Marcel Carné, 1945)
A courtesan and the four men who love her, above all Baptiste, the shy mime. The great romantic epic of French cinema.
Casque d'or (Jacques Becker, 1952)
A carpenter and a gangster's girl in Belle Époque Paris. Simone Signoret and Serge Reggiani, and a love that leads to the guillotine.
Les Grandes Manœuvres (René Clair, 1955)
A seducer's bet becomes real love, too late. Gérard Philipe and Michèle Morgan.
Hiroshima mon amour (Alain Resnais, 1959)
A brief affair in Hiroshima reawakens a French woman's memories of a forbidden wartime love.
Jules et Jim (François Truffaut, 1962)
Two friends and the free-spirited Catherine, over twenty years.
Les Parapluies de Cherbourg (Jacques Demy, 1964)
An umbrella seller's daughter and a young mechanic, separated by military service. Every line is sung.
Un homme et une femme (Claude Lelouch, 1966)
A widow and a widower in Deauville, a racing car and Francis Lai's famous theme.
Ma nuit chez Maud (Éric Rohmer, 1969)
A Catholic engineer spends a snowbound night talking with a divorced woman, and does not sleep with her.
Les Amants du Pont-Neuf (Leos Carax, 1991)
Two homeless lovers on a Paris bridge, with fireworks over the Seine and water-skiing at night.
Un cœur en hiver (Claude Sautet, 1992)
A violin maker who cannot, or will not, love.
La Vie d'Adèle (Abdellatif Kechiche, 2013)
A first love between two young women, followed over years in close-up.
Portrait de la jeune fille en feu (Céline Sciamma, 2019)
A painter and the young woman she must paint in secret, on an island in Brittany in the 18th century.
Where to go next
For more, see our 100 best French films. If you would rather laugh, try the best French comedies.