One of the oddest and most charming films of the French cinema, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is a New Wave musical, in which all the dialogue is sung. It's a candy-colored homage to Hollywood that stakes out its own emotional ground and amounts to a complicated and profound examination of the ordinary. An extremely young Catherine Deneuve plays a provincial girl whose boyfriend leaves for two years of military service in Algeria. On his last night in town, she gets pregnant, and her mother forces her into a marriage with a diamond merchant. Tragic? Yes, but life goes on. It's one of the charms of the film that both girl and guy find other kinds of happiness after their grand passion has faded. Working from a 3-part black and white negative, the film was restored to its full color glory, and remixed in Dolby stereo. A magical delight. Subtitled. More at zeitgeistfilms.com 35mm
1964, color, 1 hour 22 minutes, France