Movies I Watched - Jacques Demy July 2026

13 Aug, 2026

Back to June.

All of these were part of the Super Saturday Movie Club, whose monthly theme this time was "Best of Jacques Demy", consisting movies #29 to #32.

July 4 - Lola (1961)

One of two movies I hadn't seen before from this list, and the one I liked the least. Jacques Demy, better known to some as the husband of Agnàs Varda (I say cheekily, no reason to pit two bad bitches against one another) is one of the left bank of the French New Wave, and there are some of its hallmarks all over this thing. The way editing works, the filming on location, the way everything is composed... and yet it packs no punch. It's competent, I understand it must have looked refreshing in 1961, but the characters lack so much chemistry that it damages the bitter romanticism which Demy would later be famous for. Many critics love this movie though, and it's just completely incomprehensible to me - the romance of Demy is almost entirely lost here. 5/10.¹

July 11 - The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964)

I first watched this one on Wednesday, August 18, 2021, and I didn't really get it. Maybe I was in a foul mood, or maybe I was just unused to movies from the 60's, but whatever the case might be, it really got me this time around. It's beautiful in every aspect; the musical acting is such an interesting choice, because it has no musical numbers yet everyone sings all the time like the priest at church. This works to be build a strange unreality in the movie, although this also works against it as it flattens certain moments into the same mood as any other. That's really the only mildly negative thing I could have to say about the movie equivalent of being handed a bouquet of flowers. 9/10.

July 18 - The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967)

I first watched it on Monday, August 16, 2021, and it was one of my favourite movies ever at the time. I don't think it gets back to those heights nowadays, but it's such an ambiently pleasant movie that I can't help but love it. There's almost always someone in the background dancing, people smiling, dressed well - and it's all sharing space with some real bitterness and even a hint of horror - but all of it is done with such "lightness" for lack of a better word that it never becomes overpowering, nor does it cast doubt on the genuinity of the reality established. In this way, this movie feels to me like what it is like to be in love. 9/10.²

July 25 - Donkey Skin (1970)

The other movie I had never watched, and god damn what a beast. If Cherbourg took place mostly in a neighbourhood and Rochefort was an entire town, Donkey Skin must be what happens when you stretch that over the entirety of reality. This is, without adding or taking, the closest you can get to a perfect filmed fairy-tale - Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast, which this movie references directly through Jean Marais' costume and, uh, existence, is the closest contender. It knows exactly what it is, and it does it perfectly. Much like the previous movie, there is another tone coming out of left field here, but it's not horror; rather, this movie strikes the perfect balance between knowing it is absurd while being completely earnest.

I can imagine so clearly a world where this movie missteps slightly to one side and ends up looking like it's ashamed of what it is doing, or slightly to the other side and ends up too saccharine and unaware, but it doesn't. It toes that line masterfully, it treats things with lightness but not without gravity; the feelings of the characters feel suitably big and taken seriously, but never too big and neither too serious. I can't say it's Demy's magnum opus, but I can definitely see why it took him 10 years to get here from Lola. 9/10.