Rendez-vous in Paris DVD, 1995

Misunderstandings and misconceptions dog young love in this delightful trilogy of stories of love and coincidence in Paris. David Parkinson enjoys the director's inimitable wit and wisdom.

Communication isn't usually an issue in an Eric Rohmer film. But making a connection seems almost impossible in Rendez-vous in Paris, a delicious triptych of tales in which body language often matters as much as the dialogue.

In ‘The Seven O'Clock Rendezvous', Clara Bellar foolishly puts her trust in stranger Mathias Mégard, while attempting to spy on inconstant beau Antoine Basler, while doting Serge Renko winds up disappointed after offering self-obsessed Aurore Rauscher a shoulder to cry on, as she ponders her complex love life, in `The Benches of Paris'. Finally, in `Mother and Child', artist Michael Kraft gets his comeuppance after attempting to ditch cheery Véronika Johansson for chic Bénédicte Loye at the Picasso Museum.

Discreetly photographed by Diane Baratier, each tale is an exquisite miniature, with Paris looking sublime throughout. But it's the inimitable wit and wisdom that Rohmer slips into the mouths of his uncomprehending characters that makes this so engaging and acute in its analysis of commitment, flirtation, passion, suspicion and loneliness.

David Parkinson on 29th March 2010
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