Rencontres (1962)
Directed by Philippe Agostini

Film Review

Before he started to direct his own films in the mid-1950s, Philippe Agostini had, over two prolific decades, established himself as one of France's leading cinematographers.  His impressive filmography includes some of the all-time classics of French cinema - Marcel Carné's Le Jour se lève (1939), Robert Bresson's Les Dames du bois de Boulogne (1945) and Jules Dassin's Du rififi chez les hommes (1955).  His career as a film director was somewhat less distinguished, and after his debut with the fairly feeble comedy Le Naïf aux quarante enfants (1958) he directed only five more films for the cinema, before ending his career in the comparative anonymity of French television.

Rencontres was Agostini's fourth directorial offering for the cinema, a somewhat half-baked mélange of thriller and drama scripted by his wife Odette Joyeux, who, in the 1930 and '40s, had enjoyed a high profile career as an actress on stage and screen.  What starts out as a promising variation on the theme of Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity (1944) ends up as a stuttering mystery that is more than vaguely reminiscent of Étienne Perier's Meurtre en 45 tours (1960), but with little of that film's suspense and ingenuity.  Scripted and directed with no real flair, Rencontres struggles to fill its modest ninety minute runtime, and if it were not for its capable cast the film would have very little to commend it.

Now very much in the twilight of her career and cruelly relegated to films that were unlikely to stand the test of time, Michèle Morgan was a pale shadow of her former self, but she still had what it takes to grab your attention and make you sympathise with her character's predicament, no matter how derivative the material she was given.  As the vulnerable middle-aged woman desperate to escape a loveless marriage and grasp what is likely to be her last shot at happiness, Morgan is as magnetic as ever.  She makes an effective contrast with Pierre Brasseur's disillusioned ex-pianist, the kind of lugubrious tyrant part that the actor specialised in during his later years.  There are some engaging contributions from the supporting artistes, Diana Gregor and  Gabriele Ferzetti, but it is Michèle Morgan who does the most to salvage the film and prevent it from ending up as just another dreary potboiler.

Film Synopsis

Bella Krastner is sunbathing on a beach on the Côte d'Azur when she attracts the attention of an attractive younger man, Ralph Scaffari.  It is the start of a whirlwind romance which looks like it might last beyond the end of the summer.  Unfortunately, Bella is already married, to Carl Krastner, a once renowned pianist who has become bitter and reclusive after a car accident that irreparably damaged one of his hands.  Krastner no longer has any zest for living.  He tyrannises both his wife and his sister Laurence and divides his time between scuba diving and gambling.  After ratcheting up a small fortune in gambling debts, Krastner decides to fake his own death so that he can claim on his life insurance.

To that end, the pianist persuades Bella to help him, in return for a share of the proceeds and a promise to set her free.  Tempted by the prospect of a new life with Ralph, Bella agrees to the plan, but on the day that Krastner intends making his disappearance he appears to vanish for good.  An insurance investigator turns up at Bella's villa and begins asking awkward questions.  By now not even Bella is certain whether her husband deliberately killed himself, died in an accident or was murdered.  Ralph begins to suspect that she may have had a hand in the pianist's disappearance.  It soon appears that someone has gone to a great deal of trouble to put the noose around Bella's neck - but who, and why...?