Une chambre en ville [A Room in Town] (1982)

Well this is a very peculiar way to end my first foray into the works of Jacques Demy, given the rest of the contents of Criterion’s box set (The Essential Jacques Demy). It’s primarily his earlier works–a chunk of his early short films, followed by almost every movie from his first decade, skipping only Model Shop to […]

Peau d’âne [Donkey Skin] (1970)

Nearly completing my initial ventures into the works of Jacques Demy (via Criterion’s Essential Jacques Demy set), I had no frame of reference at all for what Donkey Skin would be. Granted, I didn’t have much for Lola or Bay of Angels, but the others I had to have some idea of since I was scheduling them for […]

La baie des anges [Bay of Angels] (1963)

I watched a Demy film of my own accord (Lola), some of his short films, brought one of his films to my in-person film club (The Young Girls of Rochefort), and another to the socially-distanced one (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg). I’ve still got some left in Criterion’s box that I picked up a few years […]

Les Parapluies de Cherbourg [The Umbrellas of Cherbourg] (1964)

I bought the Jacques Demy Criterion box on a lark–it was cheap and it was Criterion. I knew next to nothing about Demy other than his name and that he was (probably…) French. I’ve since watched Lola and enjoyed it enough to bring The Young Girls of Rochefort to the film club I ran at my workplace. […]

Les demoiselles de Rochefort [The Young Girls of Rochefort] (1967)

I don’t watch a whole lot of musicals, but I’ve long since gotten past a near-total¹ opposition to them. I’m still wary of “classic” musicals, in the ultra-Broadway fashion–there’s something that just tilts into such utter contrivance and a certain kind of plastic-y theatricality that leaves me utterly cold. But, increasingly, I’ve realized that musicals outside […]

Selected Short Films of Jacques Demy (1951-1961)

Short films: Les horizons mort [The Dead Horizons] (1951) – 8m — A young man confronts the despair of heartbreak. Le sabotier du Val de Loire [The Sabotier of the Loire Valley] (1956) – 23m — The life of a sabotier (one who makes sabots, a type of clog), is looked at, from both the functional/occupational […]

Lola (1961)

I was reminded before a viewing of Marathon Man (bear with me now) that I had purchased the Criterion “Essential Jacques Demy” set, when the pre-show reel contained a small featurette on why the Alamo Drafthouse recommends musicals, which showed bits of, I believe it was, Demy’s Umbrellas of Cherbourg and also The Young Girls of Rochefort. This […]