Bohemian Paris, 1910. Two young writers meet and become close friends. During a visit to a Greek island, they are fascinated by the smile on the face of an ancient statue, and back in Paris, the smile of a capricious young woman similarly captivates them both. Thus begins a prolonged ménage-à-trois ending in tragedy. François Truffaut’s lyrical construction and Raoul Coutard’s brilliant cinematography combine to make the story’s restlessness a physical property of the film. “There are two themes,” Truffaut said, “that of the friendship between the two men, which tries to remain alive, and that of the impossibility of living à trois.”