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The Mother and the Whore
(1973)
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Title: The Mother and the Whore (1973)
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Cast
| Complete credited cast: | |||
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Bernadette Lafont | ... | |
| Jean-Pierre Léaud | ... | ||
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Françoise Lebrun | ... | |
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Isabelle Weingarten | ... |
Gilberte
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Jacques Renard | ... |
Alexandre's Friend
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Jean-Noël Picq | ... |
Offenbach's Fan
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Plot Summary
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Storyline
In Paris, the pedantic Alexandre lives with his mate Marie in her apartment, an open relationship. Alexandre, who is idle and chauvinist, spends his days reading, drinking and shagging women. After flirting with his former affair, Gilberte, who tells him that she will marry soon her boyfriend, Alexandre meets the Laenne Hospital nurse Veronika Osterwald and they schedule a date. Alexandre learns that Veronika is a promiscuous woman that loves to shag and introduces her to Marie. They have a threesome and Alexandre has a crush on Veronika. Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
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Details
Country:
FranceLanguage:
FrenchRelease Date:
17 May 1973 (France) See more »Also Known As:
The Mother and the Whore See more »Company Credits
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Technical Specs
Runtime:
Sound Mix:
MonoColor:
Black and WhiteAspect Ratio:
1.37 : 1
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Alexandre: I saw it done in a film. Films teach you how to live, how to make a bed.
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Did You Know?
Trivia
Jean Eustache wrote the role of Alexandre specifically for Jean-Pierre Leaud. See more »Goofs
While reading the book of Gestapo at his friend's home, Alexandre is holding a cigarette in his right hand in the close-up. In the next shot he is only holding the book. See more »Quotes
Veronika: [after seeing Alexandre making the bed by jumping with the sheets on top of it] Funny way to make a bed.Alexandre: I saw it done in a film. Films teach you how to live, how to make a bed.
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It is not an easy film to watch - it is over three and a half hours long and it is composed entirely of conversations. Yet it is so incredibly compelling and ruthlessly observational of the human character, that it is, in my humble opinion, one of the very greatest films of all time.
The film is depressing, cynical and cruel. (If you want something uplifting, see Jacques Rivette's fantastic Céline and Julie Go Boating, which was made around the same time). It shows the idealism of the late 1960s to be nothing different from the society that it was trying to change.
It involves a supposedly liberated ménage-à-trois between Alexandre (played by Jean-Pierre Leaud), Marie (Bernadette Lafont) and Veronika (Francoise Lebrun). Yet Alexandre is shown to be as chauvinistic and jealous as any other man. The women are exposed as being willingly subservient and defining their femininity through the male gaze.
The film is an extremely icy end to the highly revolutionary French New Wave. This movement was one of the most significant movements in film history and had a profound effect on cinema as we know it. Jean-Pierre Leaud was one of the key actors of the New Wave, having starred (among other films) in the influential Les Quatres Cent Coups (1959) by Francois Truffaut as a rebellious teenager. Director Jean Eustache is not as well known as other directors from the New Wave, but he should be.
There is no improvisation (unlike in John Cassavetes's similar films made in the US) and the dialogue comes from real-life conversations. The film is resonant with Eustache's personal experiences. For example, Francoise Lebrun was a former lover of Eustache. Eustache himself committed suicide in 1981 and the real-life person that the character Marie was based on, did too. The anger and bitterness all culminate in a harrowing monologue by Veronika delivered directly to the audience, breaking down the coldly objective nature of the rest of the film. This mesmerising, personal, and honest filmic statement remains one of the most revealing films of human nature around.