Best movie ever!

Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

From the same team that brought us The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Demy as director and LeGrand composing the score, is the equally delightful Young Girls of Rochefort. The costumes, sets, music and dance numbers are wonderful and joyful. The cast is solid enough, although the appearance of Gene Kelly did kind of throw me a bit, I guess for his considerable contributions to movie musicals was he included, although he was fine also. I didn't quite connect with Rochefort to the degree I did with Cherbourg, but still very much worth checking out.

In many ways one is obliged to rank this film highly by virtue of its daring. As if The Umbrellas Of Cherbourg were not extraordinary enough - a through-sung musical, with a bittersweet story of provincial France rendered in in-camera Technicolour - then Les Demoiselles surely tops it. Not through-sung this time (there is spoken dialogue, though one stretch is spoken entirely in verse) there is more dance in its stead. The colour of the film is once again highly co-ordinated but heightened by the film shot almost entirely in bright sunlight. Finally, the perhaps predictable small-town love stories are fleshed out with a bizarre murder red herring and a well-controlled tension.On top of all this, the film has Gene Kelly. His smattering of appearances culminates in a formal set piece that simply assumes yo know what'll happen next and gets on with it, as if God himself had a cameo. Kelly is probably the only person in the world who might have upstaged Catherine Deneuve in a film at this time, and so it comes to pass. Even George Chakiris, the Puerto Rican prince so familiar from West Side Story, brings panache but can't eclipse the world's greatest movie-musical star.Michel Legrand's score is more varied though marginally less pungent than before. His music and the film works best when its fulfilling its camp or extrovert conviction - thought this doesn't extend to a diegetic set piece, where the girls do a Gentlemen Prefer Blondes-type routine.It's charming and baffling in one meringue-like trifle. The way to approach it is in exactly the manner that the film opens, floating into town on the Rochefort-Martrou Transporter Bridge. 7/10

We loved this movie so much we went to visit the town of Rochefort. Stars from French and American cinema do wonderful work in the movie - Catherine Deneuve, Francoise Dorleac, Gene Kelly, George Chakiris, Danielle Darrieux, and Michel Piccoli. The version now available from Netflix is beautiful and has fine sound, but we noticed one song had been deleted that was in the version we saw 10 or 15 years ago. As for Rochefort, it's a nice place to visit, on the coast halfway between Bordeaux and Nantes. The remarkable "transbordeur" bridge shown in the opening and closing scenes has been restored for operation as a tourist feature.

Its not often I feel suitably inspired or even annoyed enough to make any kind of contribution to online forums. However, such has been the effect that this wonderful film "Les Demoiselle de Rochefort" has had on me that I now feel utterly compelled to share my wild enthusiasm for this wonderfully charming musical extravaganza. I think I was finally motivated to make my feelings for "Les Demoiselles" clear given some of the naïve and somewhat misguided criticism of this extraordinary film. I stumbled across this movie only very recently. I must admit to being a little bemused seeing Gene Kelly singing in French and dancing in the main square of a certain provincial French town by the name of Rochefort - where I had myself been only three years before on vacation! It's a little bit like discovering that "American in Paris" had been made in some little local town in some languishing American or British backwater. As a lover of jazz it was Michel Legrand's fantastic and pulsating score that initially drew me to watch more and more of this captivating film. I really have to laugh at criticism of this film as being "too jazzy" or even that the music is "dated". Of course it's a movie "of its time". That's precisely the appeal of the film! What musical isn't in essence dated? Is "Top Hat" or "Gigi" any less wonderful because the music is fifty or even seventy years old? Absolute nonsense. These critics have no idea of the great French jazz tradition of such superb singers as Mimi Perrin and her "Les Double Six" or even of Ward Swingle's innovative vocal group the "Swingle Singers". As for criticism that the plot is silly or contrived and that there are too many songs? I ask you: name me any musical that isn't basically a contrived vehicle for singing and dancing? The fashions are indeed tres retro and tres cool! Certainly, the plot of "Les Demoiselles" is whimsical and eccentric. That again is precisely the charm of the film that attracts and holds the viewer. The music is indeed first class. Who could possibly criticise the dancing of Gene Kelly? I only wish Mr. Kelly had had a bigger dancing role in the film. As for the youthful, effervescent and stunning partnership of George Chakiris and Grover Dale - I utterly fail to see how those who love dance could not be totally charmed by their energetic synergy! I didn't come to this film with any prejudice or preconceptions. That's because I had never even heard of the film before I stumbled on to it last Christmas. I have since purchased the beautifully restored DVD version of "Les Demoiselles" and the sound track with Michel Legrand's superb music. I can understand somewhat how you will either love this film and be drawn mysteriously into its hypnotic Franco/American charms or like some of the misguided souls on this forum - not like it very much. Ouch! As for myself I have watched this film over seven times now and enjoy it more the more often I view it! I thoroughly encourage all readers of this post to savour the film with an open mind and let the charms of "Les Demoiselles" sooth your troubled spirits. If it's "joie de vivre" you are after then this is the complete antidote to grey skies, bad days and black moods. A film - and especially music - that will captivate you and will - as Mr. Sinatra might suggest - get "under your skin". You really can't ask any more of a musical. I must also add that Catherine Deneuve and the late Françoise Dorleac are truly alluring as the tuneful sisters as delightfully performed in the spirited and stylish "Twins Song". So, please go and watch this great film and ignore the critics! I guarantee you it's a film that you won't forget very easily! As the French might just say: "Formidable!"