A Few Hours Of Sunlight (1971) (aka Un peu de soleil dans l’eau froide)

Directed by Jacques Deray

Starring Claudine Auger, Marc Porel, Barbara Bach, Gerard Depardieu.

Based on a 1969 novel by Francoise Sagan, it sees Marc as Gilles, a young journalist with France-Presse who has been feeling very depressed lately without knowing why. He's all mixed-up as he tells a friend at work. Not even his American girlfriend (Bach), a stunning model, can cheer him up. At the suggestion of the guy from work, he goes to Limoges, where his older sister has a house in the country, to pull himself together. There he meets Nathalie (Claudine Auger), an unhappily married woman. At her initiative they begin seeing each other and although he is reluctant at first, they end up falling in love. As the summer goes by she helps him overcome his depression and eventually, when he has to return to work, he invites her to come to Paris and move in with him. At first things seem all right but eventually he begins feeling that she has given him more than he is ready for and expects too much of him, which starts oppressing him. Realising that she may have made a big mistake by leaving her husband and her previous, secure life for a younger immature man, Nathalie takes a drastic step...

A love story with a tragic end, the movie holds up quite well today. Although only 22 at the time, Marc is very good, notably at the very end, when he breaks down after Nathalie has committed suicide. It is also one of the rare chances one gets to hear his real voice. The DVD/VHS release says the movie stars Depardieu and Bach, although each have only two major scenes in the film, this is because today the actual leads, Porel and Auger, are mostly unknown to the mainstream public. This was Depardieu's third film. The dialogues were written by Jean-Claude Carriere, who at the time was also working with Luis Bunuel. Deray was a renowned French director of gangster movies and thrillers. He directed 'A Few Hours of Sunlight' after the crime movie 'Borsalino' (1970), a huge success in France starring Alain Delon and Jean-Paul Belmondo.

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