Celine og Julie

Jacques Rivette’s playful 1974 cult classic.

With its lightly surreal humour and brilliant performances, Celine og Julie—a witty, light-hearted tribute to theatre and female friendship—eventually achieved cult status.

Celine, who works as a magician in a nightclub, meets Julie, a shy librarian, in a park in Paris. They quickly become friends and move into the same apartment. They are always playing games with each other, often role-playing as one another. One evening, Celine tells a story about something happening in an old villa—she insists it is true. In the villa, a strange game is playing out between a widower, Olivier, and two women who are both in love with him. Fascinated by the story, Julie decides to visit the house.

The playfulness of Rivette’s sublime female-buddy picture, recalling the fun of «Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,» would inform Susan Seidelman’s «Desperately Seeking Susan» 11 years later. But its greatest descendant is David Lynch’s «Mulholland Drive,» another film about two women erotically attached, a house with a secret, and transformation.

Melissa Anderson, Village Voice

Cinema this alive is a rare bird, indeed.

TimeOut