This exciting thriller by André Téchiné, a Cahiers du Cinéma critic in the sixties, is perhaps not as earth-shaking as the Hollywood-genre transformations made by his Cahiers predecessors (Truffaut, Godard, Chabrol), but, with its fluid stylization and free-form approach to cinematic influence, it is within their groundbreaking territory. Téchiné approaches genre with the same wit and intelligence as the New Wave filmmakers but with a recharged passion that gives the story moving emotional undercurrents. Catherine Deneuve portrays a provincial divorcee who becomes erotically involved with an escaped convict, shaking the remaining branches of her rural family tree: her son, her ex-husband, and her mother (played by Ophuls veteran Danièlle Darrieux). Scene by scene the film recalls Ophuls or Carné or Cocteau or entire movies (Mildred Pierce or William Wyler's The Letter) and still somehow adds up to something unique, and fresh. -Tom Kemper