Review of Love and the Frenchwoman

The seven stages in the life of the modern Frenchwomen are disclosed by seven directors in a witty way: (1) Childhood: a girl asks her parents how the children are born and the adults do not know how to explain. They discuss the subject with her teacher and friends and find an unreasonable explanation. (2) Adolescence: A teenager flirts and kisses many boys and her parents are worried about her behavior. (3) Virginity: A young hairdresser is in doubt whether she shall go to bed with her fiancé. She decides to spend her first night with him before their wedding and they go to a hotel. However, she hesitates and her fiancé surprisingly decides to wait for a next time. (4) Marriage: A recently married couple travels by train to Paris for their honeymoon. During the trip, their marriage is affected by jealousy and selfishness. (5) Adultery: After ten years of marriage, a twenty-nine year-old woman is frustrated with the attitudes of her husband. When they have dinner with another couple, a young man flirts with the married woman and they have a love affair. When her husband discovers that his wife has a lover, his reaction is totally unexpected. (6) Divorce: A married couple realizes that they are now only friends and their relationship has no longer sex drive. They decide to have an amicable divorce, but her mother, their friends and the lawyers spoil their friendship. (7) The Single Woman: A Don Juan seduces women to take advantage. However, when he meets a saleswoman that lives with an old lady and a repressed friend, he seduces both women and ends in prison.

The seven segments of "La Française et l'Amour"have funny and also dated moments, but in general they are entertaining. My favorite is the first one ("Childhoo"), the fifth ("Adultery") and the sixth ("Divorce"). It is funny to see how a modern society in 1960 is do dated fifty-one years later. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "A Francesa e o Amor" ("The Frenchwoman and the Love")