Criterion Collection: The Soft Skin | Blu-ray Review

This month, Criterion marches out a little know title from Francois Truffaut, 1964’s The Soft Skin. Technically his fifth feature, and following behind the monolithic success of Jules and Jim and the 1962 short “Antoine and Colette,” (which served as the second segment in what would flourish into his Antoine Doinel series), the feature did not receive a celebrated reception. Playing in competition at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival (marking the second and last time Truffaut would compete at the festival), the title has since lapsed into a sort of oblivion, which is not surprising considering the winner of the Palme d’Or that year was Jacques Demy’s musical confection, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (launching Catherine Deneuve in stardom, younger sister of Truffuat’s headlining actress, Françoise Dorleac, already a celebrity). Described by its creator as ‘an autopsy of adultery,’ it’s a cold, bitter film about a rather unappealing affair. Yet, it’s also strangely humorous in its very realistic depiction of the inescapable traps people often set for themselves.

Pierre Lachenay (Jean Desailly) is a celebrated literary scholar, seemingly happily married to Franca (Nelly Benedetti). He’s in a hurry to catch a flight to Lisbon to promote his book, and on the way there, he meets a beautiful airline stewardess, Nicole (Francoise Dorleac). They’re staying in the same hotel and he ingratiates himself upon her. It turns out she recognizes him, and admits that they nearly met some time before when they were both scheduled to attend the same party. Their flirtation quickly becomes a full blown romance, but theirs is never a fully comfortable or completely passionate union.

Many of the existing discussions surrounding The Soft Skin refer to how Truffuat’s love of Hitchcock influenced the production. At the time, Truffaut and Claude Chabrol were collaborating on their famous book concerning Hitchcock, and it’s easy to see how Truffaut borrowed elements of aesthetic. The sometimes alarmingly pronounced score often announces a feeling of queasy unease, wrenching our attention away from the banality of this less than enthusiastic affair to ponder the eventual consequences of their actions.

The film was a major turning point for the beautiful Francoise Dorleac even though the film’s reputation was muted. Much was made at the time of how different she seemed in comparison to her sister, and Dorleac would tragically die in a car crash several years later in 1967, shortly after starring in The Young Girls of Rochefort with Deneuve. Eerily, Truffaut would eventually leave his own wife during an affair with Dorleac, mirroring Lachenay’s narrative. By 1969, the director would also work with Deneuve in his Mississippi Mermaid, and also engage in an affair that would not end satisfactorily on his end.

But Truffaut captures perfectly the dilemma of the opposing females in an adulterous scenario. Dorleac is quite empathetic, clearly not at the same academic level as her prestigious lover, but able to ascertain that theirs is a doomed affair, recognizing that a part of him actually finds her repellant. Midway through the film, a scenario as amusing as it is stressfully repellant finds Lachenay attending an out of town lecture with his mistress. But she gets locked out of the sold out venue, and social propriety finds him unable to navigate through a chokehold of little white lies, and so he must watch helplessly while sharing drinks with a colleague as his mistress is continually accosted on the street by a drunkard.

As Lachenay, actor Jean Desailly manages to be as realistic as he is unappealing. Many have criticized the film, not wanting to believe that the beautiful Dorleac would ever align themselves with such a nebbish dullard, an expert on Balzac (tellingly, an author that specialized in societal representations and human moral ambiguity). But Truffuat’s film is one of a select few that touches on unexplored sensibilities of adultery. It is quiet easy to understand why Nicole would be drawn to Lachenay, a local celebrity that’s attentive, intelligent, amd happy to satisfy certain whims. At the same time, Truffaut pays deliberate attention to the increasingly unhappy wife, played with fiery emotion by Nelly Benedetti. Truffaut absolutely nails the confrontation sequence between husband and wife, which finds an emotional proclamation quickly spin the mounting tension into separation territory. As Lachenay gladly storms out with relief, we watch as Franca gathers the blankets and heads to sleep on the living room sofa, angry, alone and devastated.

Disc Review:

Criterion’s high-definition digital restoration of The Soft Skin is handsomely presented in its original 1.66:1 aspect ratio. The prolific George Delerue’s distinctive score hums insidiously when it isn’t jarring us, and DoP Raoul Coutard, one of the most important cinematographers of the Nouvelle Vague (thanks to sublime work on many of Godard’s titles, as well as Truffuat’s Jules and Jim) plays with refracted surfaces. Mirrors figure prominently, whether the rearview mirror in capturing Lachenay’s expressions, or the purposefully placed office mirror that allows him to speak vis-à-vis with his secretary in the next room.

The Complexity of Influence:
A twelve minute video essay from filmmaker and critic Kent Jones (currently filming a documentary on Truffaut’s book Cinema According to Hitchcock) discusses particular references to Hitchcock within The Soft Skin.

Mr. Truffaut Meets Hitchcock:
This 1999 documentary from film historian Robert Discher is a thirty minute feature concerning Hitchcock and Truffaut, opening on footage from an AFI Achievement Award for Hitchcock where Truffaut is speaking. Claude Chabrol also features prominently in discussing influences and inspirations in his own filmography.

Truffaut on The Soft Skin:
From December, 1965, this eleven minute segment from the French television program Cineastes de notre temps finds Truffaut speaking about the making of The Soft Skin. The director discusses the difficulty he had creating something so cold and clinical, as well as a handful of moments in the film that are wholly unrealistic but filmed stylistically for dramatic effect.

Final Thoughts:

Belonging to a small handful of neglected Truffaut titles (though it hasn’t been treated as unfairly as his 1972 title A Gorgeous Girl Like Me), Criterion’s restoration readies The Soft Skin for reconsideration. The title appears to be a reference to the human tendency to exploit others in order to gain access to these private, guarded, and taboo spaces. The film opens on a pair of unclaimed hands, whereby a woman absentmindedly plucks at the wedding ring of a man’s hand. Dorleac is often announced first with a part of her body, such as when Lachenay eyes stray to her feet in the airplane as we watch her change shoes. During their ill-fated getaway, those sable stockings he scrambles to buy for her make a pointed appearance as he peels them off of her sleeping body, though we cut away before the encroaching transgression, landing in the midst of breakfast the next morning. It seems important to note that Lachenay’s illicit getaway with Nicole was to introduce a film directed by Marc Allegret (known for his adaptation of Pagnol’s Fanny), a man that famously had affairs with Cocteau and Andre Gide (the Nobel Prize winning author whose work contended that one should own up to one’s own sexual nature without betraying one’s values). Perhaps Truffuat’s inclusion of Allegret, who reputedly announced an eventual preference for women, is a nod to the complicated nature of having to explore desire while navigating restrictive guidelines dictated by cultural and social mores. And perhaps the violent retribution Lachenay receives is merely a move to assuage Truffaut’s own guilt.

Film: ★★★★/☆☆☆☆☆
Disc: ★★★★/☆☆☆☆☆