Mademoiselle

All i have to say...
By San Fran chornical

DvD review

It's a subtle, heartfelt film of a kind we don't make in this country. The release is especially welcome in that it adds another Sandrine Bonnaire title into circulation. She plays a married sales executive who meets a group of wedding entertainers while on a business trip. Circumstances keep preventing them from separating, and so, during the course of a day, she and an actor (Jacques Gamblin) find themselves becoming increasing drawn to each other. The emotional dynamics are subtle and complicated. The film is about romance, but elements of class come into play as well. There's a small but telling moment, unlike anything you'd see in a Hollywood film, in which the woman, after calling for the evening train schedule, corrects herself and asks for the morning schedule. In doing so, she's the one who decides to spend the night with the man, just as she - despite her easygoing cheer and his masculine sullenness - is truly in control...

Hard Film to Describe, but Simply Wonderful!
I saw this film on an Air France jet coming back to the US in 2000. I had never heard of Sandrine Bonnaire or Jacques Gamblin before this film, but now I have tried to see every Sandrine Bonnaire film I can find. I actually bought a region free DVD player (they do have them, they are legal) so I could watch this film back in 2001 when released.

Sandrine is a superb actress and to my eye, absolutely exquisite. She looks soulfully out of her car (Sandrine fans know what that looks like) as she sees a lighthouse and remembers meeting and spending time with an impromptu theater group that did certain made to order skits at her company's party and meeting. Jacques Gamblin plays the object of her interest and she, for a while, performs a skit or two with the others at a high priced wedding, etc. (The young hostess of the hotel where the group stays is hysterical).

The theme of the film is that Sandrine keeps missing a train, plane, coach bus, etc., that would take...

Subtle...Like Fine Wine...
As one of the reviewers said - Americans just can't or won't make films like this one! This film works on so many levels, it's almost perfect. In "Mademoiselle" - from 2000 and directed by Phillipe Lioret, when Claire (Sandrine Bonnaire) and Pierre (Jaques Gamblin) met by chance, they were instantly drawn to each other. Their deep connection is revealed through a subtle exchange not so much in words but through gestures. They started an improptu-romance that neither one wanted or expected. In the end, the lasting influence of their brief love affair, will never leave either one of them. The film was so eloquent in its expression of human emotions, poetry done the French way. The lead actors were both excellent as the two love-struck and kindred spirits. Over the years (since "Police" 1985) I have watched the beautiful - Sandrine Bonnaire blossom into one of the most talented actors working anywhere, she is a natural! Jaques Gamblin is also one of the finest French actors of his...

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