"The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" - Film Review

“They don’t make ‘em like they used to,” the old saying goes, and far and few between has that sentiment been more apt than for The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. This is filmmaking at its purest; here is a film crafted to be fun, entertaining, and immersive. And yet it still manages to say something meaningful about the human condition and all that good junk us serious film types like to discuss. The film is a French operatic (every single line is sung) story of romance, love, and loss that utilizes its music and its striking atmosphere to perfectly exude the feelings and emotions of its characters.

Think back to the first time you were in love; now consider the devastating heartbreak that accompanied being unable to be with that one person you were so maddeningly, deeply in love with. That’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg in a nutshell. The film manages to remarkably distill that kind of experience and the hold such experiences have over us.  

Carried by it all is the happy-go-lucky, wide eyed visage of Catherine Deneuve as Geneviève Emery. Her popularity blew up in the wake of the film’s release and it’s not entirely surprising. Though Deneuve’s lines were dubbed (by Danielle Licari), it’s the youthful vigor and enthusiasm of Deneuve that makes so many of the great hyperbolic, starry-eyed, love-struck lines work. 

The film is eye-popping with dazzling colors, and it’s hard to decide whether Michel Legrand’s music or the brilliant visuals is more wonderfully infectious. It’s difficult not to be smiling at the utter sincerity and charm of the film. While many modern films have a level of cynicism or a jaded vision, the film, even as it takes darker turns later on, never succumbs to a totally bleak or miserable worldview. 

Director Jacques Demy is one of the lesser known figures of the French New Wave. Not as interested in political or structural concerns as his contemporaries, what makes Umbrellas stand out is how fantastical it feels. Demy chooses every detail (the ties, the wallpaper, etc.) so its colors will visually explode out from the screen. The film resembles a heightened fairytale; only instead it lends this imaginativeness towards describing the events of ordinary, everyday people. 

We’re lucky the film still exists. Almost all the negatives for the film had become faded and unusable. But thankfully the film was restored in the late 90’s, which allows us to still watch this fun, vibrant gem. 

Grade: A