The Flip Side of War

La Vie de Chateau. Normandy. The 6th of June, 1944. Fire bombs explode overhead. Parachutes dot the warm night sky. Below, a captain of the Resistance is locked in combat with a German major. The cause of their quarrel: a woman, naturally. In France, D-day or no Dday, S for sex comes first.

In this slapstick comedy, even the Occupation takes second place to the preoccupation--cherchez la femme. The plot is as old as Gaul, and only a new director would have the gall to tell it again: the sleepy middle-aged husband, the nubile wife, the young stranger (Henri Garcin). But Jean-Paul Rappeneau, 33, has an appetite for the absurd and an unerring eye for casting. An actor in the mugging tradition of Toto and Fernandel, Philippe Noiret is excellent as the pawky, paunchy husband; and Catherine Deneuve, as his restless wife, is as light and tart as a lemon souffle. They and their fellow farceurs prove that in the right hands the flip side of war and the flop side of marriage can still be made fresh and funny.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.