A Gorgeous Girl Like Me

A Gorgeous Girl Like Me
Theatrical release poster
Directed byFrançois Truffaut
Screenplay byJean-Loup Dabadie
François Truffaut
Based onSuch a Gorgeous Kid Like Me
by Henry Farrell
Produced byMarcel Berbert
StarringBernadette Lafont
CinematographyPierre-William Glenn
Edited byYann Dedet
Music byGeorges Delerue
Production
company
Les Films du Carrosse
Distributed byWarner-Columbia Film
Release date
  • 12 September 1972 (1972-09-12)
Running time
100 minutes
CountryFrance
LanguageFrench
Box office684,919 admissions (France)[1]

A Gorgeous Girl Like Me (French: Une belle fille comme moi), also known as A Gorgeous Bird Like Me, is a 1972 French film directed by François Truffaut, starring Bernadette Lafont. It is based on Henry Farrell's 1967 novel of the same name.

Truffaut called it "a sarcastic comedy thriller."[2]

Plot

Stanislas Previne is a young sociologist preparing a thesis on criminal women. He meets Camille Bliss in prison to interview her. Camille is accused of having murdered her lover Arthur and her father. She tells Stanislas about her life and her love affairs.

Stanislas, much to the frustration of his secretary, who also has a crush on him, soon falls in love with Camille and works to find the evidence to prove her innocence. His secretary tries to convince the sociologist that Camille is a "manipulative slut" but he cannot be convinced. Through investigation, the sociologist and his secretary find a young boy, an amateur filmmaker, who has captured the evidence they need on film to secure Camille's release from prison.

Once free, Camille, who always has loved music and has seduced the cabaret singer Sam Golden earlier in the film, becomes a cause célèbre and a singing star. Stanislas meets her after a performance, and she seduces him at her home; however, her husband (who is cuckolded many times during the film) discovers them and beats him up. Camille kills her husband and then plants the gun on her passed-out paramour.

When Stanislas is imprisoned for murder, Camille will do nothing to help the man who once freed her. As he cleans up the prison yard, in the film's final segment, the camera pans to show Stanislas's secretary typing a manuscript on a nearby balcony, presumably the thesis that Stanislas began, but this time preparing one that will expose Camille as the manipulative seductress that Stanislas discovered her to truly be.

Cast

References

  1. ^ Box Office information for Francois Truffaut films at Box Office Story
  2. ^ Mills, Bart. "Tho audiences may be jaded, Truffaut will remain Truffaut". Chicago Tribune, 6 Aug 1972: i13.
  3. ^ Allen, Don. Finally Truffaut. New York: Beaufort Books. 1985. ISBN 0-8253-0335-4. OCLC 12613514. pp. 233.