La Chamade (Heartbeat)

Description

Parlez-vous seduction? Screen siren Catherine Deneuve sizzles in this vibrant, sexy and deeply moving (The Film Daily) tale of a wealthy man's mistress, a poor man's lover and no man's fool.Brimming with intensity, charm and eroticism (Films and Filming), and executed with elegance and taste (Motion Picture Exhibitor) La Chamade presents a torrid tangle of desire, denial and deception that will leave you breathless! The expensively kept girlfriend of a wealthy older man, Lucille is beautiful, bored and blissfully blind to her shallow existence untilshe meets Antoine. Passionate but poor, Antoine offers a whole new world of experience and kindles Lucille's smoldering desires. But as the charms of Antoine's workaday life begin to fade, Lucille must choose between the love of her life and the love of her lifestyle.

Customer Reviews:

A visual discussion of man's incomprehension of woman.......2006-11-16

Catherine Deneuve is one of film's all time great beauties who has also become a very fine actress. At this point in her career, she was still blank but beautiful. Her Director put this to good use, casting her as a woman who is pampered, spoiled, a woman for whom life has given her so much she is completely lost and has no idea what she really wants, but drifts from vague whim to whim.
Of course, she is such a beauty that she is perfect casting for this kind of woman who has men falling over themselves just to light her cigarette, and the kind of jealousy and possessive controlling impulses beauty brings out in men.
Lightly handled, this film is a visual discussion of the true nature of love, and the tradeoffs we make in finding the right relationship. Money and stability, passion and poverty are contrasted, with some surprising revelations about what makes a love meaningful and lasting. Yves St. Laurent supplies the really amazing wardrobe for the sequences of wealth ( I counted at least 5 really flawlessly coutured coats), which seems at first to make this film very glossy and superficial and "what will she wear next" - but this supplies our framework of seeing how unimportant these things are to her, and also builds a great contrast for the sections of everyday financial struggles.
This film is greater than the sum of it's parts. Great costumes, some postcard style cinematography, and a fine performance by Roger Van Hool as the obsessed Antoine, and an exceptional, nuanced performance by Michel Piccoli as Charles. (He and Deneuve had made several films together by this point, which augments the familiar feeling between them.)
Because DeNeuve is still young here, and the essential capricious coldness of her character, this film does not supply as much emotional connection or depth as it could. We have only Piccoli as a window for that, so this film becomes a man's view of the beautiful woman they adore, and a fine representation of their incomprehension of women. Historically, falling in step with "free love" and early feminism, it is a great representation of that special time when men really could not figure out what women wanted... because women were still trying to figure it out themselves.

PHOTOROMAN.......2004-04-21

Remember those illustrated novellas that our mothers used to enjoy reading.You had the spoiled girl who had an affair with an older man.Usually,she meets a younger man who is less fortunate.The woman to make ends meet gets a job in a library,but it doesn't take long for her to be bored and she returns to the older man who brings her security.This is basically the story of LA CHAMADE.CATHERINE DENEUVE was 25 at the time and she was indeed gorgeous,but that is not enough to save a film that is so predictable.My favorite scene is the one at the airport when LUCILLE is waiting for CHARLES and gets annoyed by another man.She says to him :fichez-moi la paix!If you buy this for the bonus features,don't bother,they did not include a photo gallery of DENEUVE.

Heavy on the Gloss.......2004-02-11

Yet another of Francois Sagan's chic, sleek, and shallow sudsers. Sagan has always examined the sins, immoralities, and weaknesses of privalged parisians, and 'La Chamade' is no exception. Basically, it's style striving for substance. Does it acheive it? No. Is that okay? Yes. 'La Chamade' is an agreeable distraction as it features a Love vs. Money storyline played out against swinging 60's Paris (with a side trip to the Mediteranian!). Catherine Deneuve looks stunning (as always) in a series of late 60s haute couture, the characters thrash about in gorgeous settings, and drive great cars. It's everything one would have watched 'Dynasty' for, however, as the film is in french the subtitles allow you to feel slightly superior and not so guilty for enjoying it!

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