August 29th: NEAR OROUËT (Jacques Rozier, 1971)

Three young women from Paris take their vacation on the west coast of France, and are followed by an awkward male co-worker.

Jacques Rozier was part of the French New Wave, making several shorts before shooting his debut feature Adieu Phillipine in 1960, which took him an extra two years to complete due to missing sound tracks. It premiered to great critical reception at the Cannes Film Festival and received much praise from Cahiers du cinema, but its lack of commercial success resulted in a long wait to receive funding for a follow-up.

In the early 1970s, two young TV producers came to Rozier's rescue, though to save money the next film would have to be shot on 16mm instead of 35mm. Rozier was able to upgrade to color in the process, however. The scenario was conceived with Alain Raygot.

The cast is filled with newcomers, the trio of actresses Caroline Cartier, Daniele Croisy, and Françoise Guégan, as well as the male lead Bernard Menez. Improvisation was encouraged by Rozier, as with his previous works he was interesting in depicting youth culture as accurately as possible.

The film was shot on location on the Atlantic coast as well as in Paris, in a handheld verité style. Rozier contrasts the freedom and fun of vacation with the onset of ennui and disappointment, forgoing typical story structure and conflict with various vignettes.

Again, Rozier was able to premiere his film at Cannes, in the Directors' Fortnight sidebar. Also again, unfortunately he was unable to find commercial success, but only had to wait three years to make another film.

Du côte d'Orouët was eventually blown-up to 35mm and re-released in the mid-1990s, and a Rozier boxed set has helped to rescue him from obscurity, some of his films showing in New York in recent years thanks to the French Institute Alliance, and at the L.A. Film Festival thanks to guest programmer, director Alfonso Cuaron.

Running time is 2 hrs, 30 min.