Mississippi Mermaid

BEAUTIFUL 35MM PRINT!  ► Truffaut’s alluring thriller, a Vertigo-like tale of sexual obsession and betrayal, is dedicated to Jean Renoir and features Catherine Deneuve and Jean-Paul Belmondo, the highest-paid French stars of the day, in the leads. Belmondo plays a wealthy tobacco planter on the French island of Réunion in the Indian Ocean. Deneuve — clothed here by Yves Saint-Laurent — is the beautiful mail-order bride from France who just might be an impostor. When she absconds with his bank account, he hires a private detective to track her down – and the real drama begins. Truffaut described Mississippi Mermaid as a film about “degradation, by love.” The film is based on a novel by Cornell Woolrich (aka William Irish), who may have penned more film noir source material than any other writer; Hitchcock’s Rear Window and Truffaut’s The Bride Wore Blackwere also Woolrich adaptations. The film’s Hitchcockian antecedents includeMarnie as well as Vertigo; the wealth of cinematic allusions — Cocteau, Godard, Johnny Guitar, Bogart — is characteristic of Truffaut. Mississippi Mermaid screens here in its version intégrale, which restores 13 minutes cut from the original North American release. “Truffaut’s most successful attempt to blend a complex, Hitchcockian genre film with his own personality” (James Monaco). “The creation of a superior moviemaker who works eccentrically in the classical tradition” (New York Times). Colour, 35mm, in French with English subtitles. 122 mins.