The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
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Synopsis
An angelically beautiful Catherine Deneuve was launched to stardom by this dazzling musical heart-tugger from Jacques Demy. She plays an umbrella-shop owner's delicate daughter, glowing with first love for a handsome garage mechanic, played by Nino Castelnuovo. When the boy is shipped off to fight in Algeria, the two lovers must grow up quickly. Exquisitely designed in a kaleidoscope of colors, and told entirely through the lilting songs of the great composer Michel Legrand, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is one of the most revered and unorthodox movie musicals of all time.
Picture 10/10
Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, the third film in Criterion’s Essential Jacques Demy box set, is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1. The new 1080p/24hz high-definition transfer is presented on the dual-layer Blu-ray while the standard-definition version is found on the included dual-layer DVD. The latter has been enhanced for widescreen televisions.
The first colour film in the set the title also has the distinction of probably delivering the set’s best high-definition transfer. Colours are the true stand out, looking to be rendered purely and accurately. Blues, pinks, reds, greens, everything, are all rich and vibrant. Black levels are deep and inky with no loss of detail in darker sequences.
There are no artifacts to speak of and the transfer retains a natural filmic look. The level of detail is rather extraordinary, providing rich textures—as shown in some of the jackets Deneuve wears throughout—and depth. The print has been nicely cleaned up and nothing of note remains in terms of damage, and film grain has been left intact, looking clean and natural.
The DVD's transfer isn't as sharp obviously, the textures aren't anywhere near as rich, and compression is a little more obvious. Colours are still fairly vivid and clean, though they admittedly don’t pop like they do on the Blu-ray but this has more to do with the limitations of the format. For a standard-definition transfer it’s still an excellent one.
But the Blu-ray’s is truly exceptional, bright, vivid and lively, fitting for such an energetic film.
Audio 8/10
The film is delivered in 5.1 surround: DTS-HD MA on the Blu-ray and Dolby Digital on the DVD. In either case the track is certainly more monaural in nature, aiming a good chunk of audio towards the fronts with very little movement between them. Activity in the rear speakers is primarily limited to subtly delivering sections of Legrand’s score. It rarely calls attention to itself but it does effectively immerse the viewer. Obviously restored and remixed the score never sounds to be a product of its age, bringing superb dynamic range and fidelity. Dialogue/singing sounds clear and articulate and the source has been nicely cleaned up as I didn’t detect any damage or general wear.
The lossless track to me sounds far more dynamic and clear when compared to the Dolby Digital one found on the DVD, and the distinction between the two was very obvious. But both ultimately deliver a pleasing audio presentation.
Extras 8/10
One of the more stacked titles in Criterion’s Jacques Demy set, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg starts with a 2008 episode from the program A Film and its Time. Entitled Once Upon a Time… “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” it’s similar in structure to an episode from the same program found on Criterion’s edition of Tess: it offers a general production history of the film, while also going over certain landmark moments that were happening at the time and how the film came to somehow address them or at least maybe be some sort of reprieve of sorts from them. For the film’s production it goes over the development of the music through an interview with Legrand, and then gets into detail about the difficulty in finding financing, the casting of Deneuve, its actual production and then the success it had after its release. The documentary also looks at the wave of music being released at the time, women’s rights, and the general malaise that was felt in France after the Algerian war, which is of course a major plot point in the film. There’s also a portion dedicated to the French New Wave and how Demy fit into that, even if his films (at least his later ones) didn’t exactly fit the mold. I actually enjoy these and appreciate that they’re not your typical making-ofs, simply going by the numbers, but they try to also offer some context from the time period. This episode runs around 54-minutes.
Following this is a new 23-minute interview with film scholar Rodney Hill. In it he talks about the French New Wave, how it came to be, and what it represented. Though Demy is a member of the New Wave directors his films can get overlooked as being “New Wave” because they don’t fit the general ideal of what a New Wave film is. He gives a brief history as to how the New Wave was born (a sort of retaliation to what many considered overblown, big budget French films) and checks off a list of common, though not necessary factors that go into a New Wave film: they are usually personal, casual in look (low lighting or at least natural light), freely reference other films and filmmakers, non-traditional editing, and so on. Demy’s Lola and Bay of Angels certainly fit that list, but he argues how his later bigger, more polished spectacles still follow some of these same elements. In all honesty I’m not overly concerned whether Umbrellas or The Young Girls of Rochefort and so on follow whatever “rules” have been associated with the French New Wave, but Hill does actually deliver a fairly decent primer on the movement and the feature probably works best for that.
Criterion next digs up an interview with Michel Legrand and Demy from the archives. From a 1964 episode of the French program Cinépanorama the two talk about the all-musical aspect of the film and how they came to decide to go this route with the film. Though the interviewer keeps questioning Legrand about the validity of a musician doing film scores (he basically keeps asking him questions around how film scores are seen as a “lesser” effort in the music world) it’s actually a fairly decent interview with the two talking about their goals with the. They even ask the all-important question as to whether Demy sings in the shower. The excerpt runs about 11-minutes.
We then get two audio segments from conversations with Michel Legrand and Catherine Deneuve recorded at the National Film Theatre in 1991 and 1983 respectively.
Legrand’s runs about 27-minutes and features the composer talking about his life and his career path. He covers his possible influences (his dad, who left one day to get matches only to never return may have been one) and his training. He’s asked about the German occupation and any possible influences it may have had (he admits that as a child he didn’t really see the danger) and then how he got into film scoring, becoming a sort of darling of New Wave directors. He covers Lola, his first collaboration with Demy after Quincy Jones was unable to write a song for the film, and amusingly recounts how he first saw the film: since Demy didn’t have the money to finish the sound he showed it to Legrand silent but recited all the dialogue himself. He then talks about Umbrellas and other collaborations.
Deneuve’s segment only runs about 11-minutes but she gets into great detail about getting into acting (her sister was the primary reason) and recalls the filming of Umbrellas, the period of which she calls one of her best memories. The film and Demy also taught her a lot about film acting and she shares these lessons, primarily how to work with the camera, which you can’t be completely unaware of.
Both are very solid segments, offering a more personal look at the two and their work while also giving a nice bit of background information about the film’s production.
There is then a 6-minute restoration demonstration showing the work that went into cleaning up the film and restoring its colours, and their desire to keep it true to Demy’s wishes. You get to see some examples and some before-and-after shots. The disc then closes with a theatrical trailer.
After the previous two films in the set were practically skimmed over it was nice to get some features that focused quite thoroughly on their respective film, not only offering elements about the making of the film but also taking a more academic approach in some areas as well. A nicely put together roster of supplements.
Closing
One of the stronger discs in Criterion’s box set The Essential Jacques Demy, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg sports a super audio and video presentation and a great collection of engaging supplements.
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