Movies – The Delphine Seyrig Project – Stolen Kisses

Delphine Seyrig and Jean-Pierre Léaud in “Stolen Kisses.” credit: travelingboy.com

1962’s Antoine And Colette, François Truffaut’s second episode (of 5) of the Antoine Doinel bildungsroman films, finds Antoine free of the Youth Observation Center to which he had been relegated to in The 400 Blows (Les Quatre Cents Coups), and relievedly making his own post-adolescent way in the real world of Paris, young and employed. Working at a large music/record distributor, Antoine (Jean-Pierre Léaud) also gets tickets to classical concerts, and happens upon Colette (Marie-France Pisier) there one night. They become friends and get together often for concerts, lectures and shopping, and while Colette enjoys having Antoine as a friend among many friends, Antoine is a bit more smitten and obsessive. Colette isn’t interested in an exclusive relationship with Antoine, much to his disappointment, but the story ends with him still pals with her parents, as the three of them settle in to watch TV while Colette is nonchalantly picked up by another young man for a date.

Meanwhile, six years on, our Delphine Seyrig, after surveying Hedda Gabler, did a small voiceover stint on Charles Belmont’s 1968 adaptation of Boris Vian’s Spray of the Days (L’Écume Des Jours) (also remade by Michel Gondry in 2013 as Mood Indigo), and did splendid work on William Klein’s Mr. Freedom.

Delphine Seyrig in “Stolen Kisses.” credit: thehistorialist.com

So, clearly, it was as good a time as any for Delphine to work with François Truffaut on his third Antoine Doinel installment, Stolen Kisses (Baisers Volés) (France, 1968). We discover that Antoine (Jean-Pierre Léaud), having enlisted in the French military, didn’t especially distinguish himself there, and the film opens with his dishonorable discharge. His old apartment is still there, though, with the same balcony and view of Sacré-Cœur, and he strikes out to look up an old infatuation, Christine (Claude Jade). She’s not in, but Antoine, characteristically, always gets along with his paramours’ parents better than the girls themselves, and Christine’s father Lucien (Daniel Ceccaldi) gives Antoine a lead on a hotel night watchman job. He botches that job in amusing and novel fashion, through no real fault of his own, but falls into another job at a private investigation firm, which leads to another round of well-intentioned bungling, all occurring while he’s still trying to woo Christine.

Jean-Pierre Léaud and Claude Jade in “Stolen Kisses.” credit: travelingboy.com

Unlike the more serious-minded linear chronicle of Antoine in 400 Blows, Stolen Kisses, like the 30-minute short Antoine And Colette, is more of a series of humorous episodes, but Jean-Pierre Léaud still maintains Antoine’s earnestly striving diligence, even in the face of his comic shortcomings. Antoine’s private-eye support generally involves following persons-of-interest (who always “make” him) until he lands a (somewhat) undercover assignment in a high-end shoe store for its taciturn and suspicious owner, Georges Tabard (a superbly droll Michael Lonsdale). (“Nobody likes me, and I’d like to know why.”) But Antoine’s shoe-store stock-clerk investigation is thrown for a loop when he encounters Tabard’s elegant and engaging wife Fabienne (Delphine). Antoine (like myself, I confess) finds Fabienne almost impossibly radiant and gracious, and his mixed emotions interfere with his comportment towards Christine. Meanwhile, Fabienne learns about Antoine’s starry eyes for her from the other salesgirls, and she pours on the charm even more disconcertingly. The ultimate conclusion of the Fabienne Affair could be seen as a bit of male-fantasy-fulfillment or sexually-self-possessed-female-self-indulgence, but there’s an undeniably late-60s French attitude here that Truffaut captures in all its sly sensuality and contradiction without so much as a wink or kiss or doffed piece of clothing.

Luckily, the ever-patient Christine is still on the other side of each of Antoine’s misadventures, and even in the face of a challenge to his own renewed amorous overtures, the film ends with he and Christine walking arm-in-arm down a sunny tree-lined Paris street to a lilting Charles Trenet chanson d’amour.

Delphine Seyrig in “Stolen Kisses.” credit: http://filmfanatic.org

Cinematographer Denys Clerval’s color photography is quite good, if a bit safe. There’s a big variety of spaces and locations, though, and he navigates them seamlessly. Likewise, Antoine Duhamel’s musical score is admirable textbook accompaniment, but lacks the tonal subtleties of a typical Georges Delerue score, Truffaut’s usual go-to composer. But even with the slightly shaken-up technical staff, this is an extraordinarily charming and evocative film, and another showcase of how much La Seyrig can do with seemingly limited resources.