Jean-Paul Belmondo plays a wealthy industrialist living on the island of La Réunion (the locale changed from the New Orleans of the novel), who orders a bride by mail and receives, in place of his intended, Catherine Deneuve and a flimsy (but acceptable) explanation. “The framework is pure film noirmaterial, but the sentiments it contains are worthy of Jean Renoir, to whom the film is dedicated. . . . [It] begins as a mystery, evolves into a Hitchcockian chase suspense, and ends as a Truffautesque love story—altogether the most ambitious mix of genres so far” (James Monaco, New Wave).