


The story moves toward its supremely logical yet imaginative conclusion so stealthily that the kicker joke is perfect. Massari is superb as Clara, the carelessly sensual mother Clara is shamelessly loose and free, and she's loved by her sons because of her indifference to the bourgeois forms, which they nevertheless accept-on the surface, that is.
MUTINY ON BOUNTY SCRIPT IT ALWAYS MAKES ME. LAUGH MOVIE
Though the movie itself reveals the sources of Malle's humor, this story probably wouldn't have been nearly so funny or, perhaps, so affectionate if Malle had told it 15 years earlier. This is perhaps the first time on film that anyone has shown us the bourgeoisie enjoying its privileges. His bourgeois bestiary is funny and appalling and also-surprisingly-hardy and happy. Malle sees not only the prudent, punctilious surface but the volatile and slovenly life underneath. He looks into his own backyard-the film is set in Dijon in 1954 at the time of Dien Bien Phu, and it's about the sex education of the 14-year-old Laurent (Benoit Ferreux), the youngest, brightest son of a successful gynecologist (Daniel Gélin) and his Italian-born wife (Léa Massari). Louis Malle's exhilarating high comedy about French bourgeois life.

France-Germany-Italy (1971): Drama/Comedyġ18 min, Rated R, Color, Available on videocassette and laserdisc
