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| Les Bonnes Femmes |
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| Originally released: 1960 |
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For some reason, this film almost sank Chabrol's career. Released the
same year as Psycho and Peeping Tom, it's in good company as a
misunderstood work of meta-cinematic genius. Outwardly, it is the
tale of four shopgirls who each seek the fulfilment not provided by
their work in, respectively (it's as schematic as any Chabrol film),
class aspirations, career advancement, theatrical performance,
and, least successfully, romance. The brutality with which the girls'
dreams are crushed appalled literal-minded critics at the time, but
this is a film about the needs that cinema's screen-dreams can never
fulfil, and a great one at that.
Henry K Miller
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