7/10
Another study in a teenage girl's destructive dislike for her widowed father's lover
21 May 2007
The films of Otto Preminger share for the most part a detached objectivity in their attitudes to character and moral issues…

In "Bonjour Tristesse," his gamine protégé Cecile (Jean Seberg) is a very peculiar girl, maybe spoiled and willful and arrogant and lazy…

Anne (Deborah Kerr) had made her look at herself for the first time in her life…And that turned her against her… And now, her father is not having fun anymore, which was probably another reason she decided to get rid of her… How carefully and how seriously she went about that decision, is the tale of Françoise Sagan, published in 1954, by the time she was nineteen…

Raymond (David Niven) is a bundle of surprises… For him, it's such a wonderful fun to have Cecile for a daughter… And loving Anne doesn't mean that he loves his daughter any less… The wealthy playboy becomes serious from the moment that Anne arrived… He could never think of her as just someone to have fun with… He does have fun with Elsa (Mylène Demongeot) but that's a long way from being all he wants… Now, he has never wanted any woman the way he wants Anne…

Anne spent her honeymoon by the sea 12 years ago… She had quite a debate with herself before coming down to the French Riviera… For knowing that Elsa was there, she got stupidly angry and decided to leave…Then the prospect of packing and looking for a hotel was too much after that long drive so she decided to stay…

Being too sophisticated (maybe for discovering occupied territory), Anne was as suspicious of summer as she was of Raymond in spite of the fact that she knew him 15 years ago, and was quite sure that with him, nobody is safe…

For Cecile, Anne is prim and prissy and prude… For a woman who hates vulgarities—even when they're funny—she could never be seriously interested in a man like her father… So part of her was angry, part was happy, all of her was excited… Her father had brought a girl to the seashore, made her go out in the sun and then when she was a mess of peeling, dropped her like a hot lobster… It was unfair… Yet even while she was angry at him, she was proud that he had gotten the unattainable Anne… Anne looks now softer… She moves easier… In the morning, she seems as though she had the most wonderful secret in the world…

Suddenly she becomes aware of a great responsibility towards Cecile, as it would be good if she stops seeing Philippe (Geoffrey Horne) and studies for her philosophy examination…

Cecile becomes furious at her interference… Anne wants her to study and not to see Philippe… So what shall it be? For her, there'll be a man to take care of her…And she doesn't need a diploma for that…

Now she hates Anne… For her, she has changed her father…She'll change her and will change everything
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