Directed by Jacques Demy • 1973 • France
Starring Marcello Mastroianni, Catherine Deneuve, Micheline Presle
Feeling out of sorts, Marco (Marcello Mastroianni), an Italian driving instructor living in Paris, pays a visit to the doctor, who promptly diagnoses him as . . . four months pregnant. It’s the medical miracle heard round the world, as Marco becomes fodder for the press, a curiosity to the scientific community, and a cash cow for a maternity-wear company—while leaving his hairdresser wife (Catherine Deneuve) alternately gobsmacked and delighted. Jacques Demy, directing in his très charmant, candy-colored visual style, plays the absurdist premise for both cheery comedy and slyly subversive social commentary, raising serious questions about male-female social roles and gender equality.
Up Next in The Essential Jacques Demy
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Une chambre en ville
Directed by Jacques Demy • 1982 • France
Starring Dominique Sanda, Michel Piccoli, Richard BerryIn this musical melodrama set against the backdrop of a workers’ strike in Nantes, Dominique Sanda plays a young woman who wishes to leave her brutish husband (Michel Piccoli) for an earthy steelwork...
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Jacquot de Nantes
Directed by Agnès Varda • 1991 • France
Starring Philippe Maron, Édouard Joubeaud, Laurent MonnierAgnès Varda’s tender evocation of the childhood of her husband, Jacques Demy—a dream project that she realized for him when he became too ill to direct it himself—is a wonder-filled portrait of the...
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The Young Girls Turn 25
Directed by Agnès Varda • 1993 • France
For this documentary about the making of THE YOUNG GIRLS OF ROCHEFORT, filmmaker Agnès Varda, director Jacques Demy’s widow, returned to the town of Rochefort for the film’s twenty-fifth anniversary. In it, she interviews actors Catherine Deneuve, Jacque...
