Josiane Balasko Movies

Director Roman Polanski casts himself in the lead of the psychological thriller The Tenant. Trelkovsky (Polanski) rents an apartment in a spooky old residential building, where his neighbors -- mostly old recluses -- eye him with suspicious contempt. Upon discovering that the apartment's previous tenant, a beautiful young woman, jumped from the window in a suicide attempt, Trelkovsky begins obsessing over the dead woman. Growing increasingly paranoid, Trelkovsky convinces himself that his neighbors plan to kill him. He even comes to the conclusion that Stella (Isabel Adjani), the woman he has fallen in love with, is in on the "plot." Ultimately, Polanski assumes the identity of the suicide victim -- and inherits her self-destructive urges. Some critics found the movie tedious and overdone; others compared it to Polanski's early breakthrough, Repulsion. The film was based on Le Locataire Chimerique, a novel by Roland Topor. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Jean-Paul Belmondo plays Michel Gauché, a stunt double and trickster who is crazy in love with his former fiancee, work-mate, and fellow stunt performer Jane (Raquel Welch). She, however, is so angry with him for landing her in the hospital due to a badly performed stunt that she breaks off the engagement. Belmondo also plays Bruno Ferrari, the movie star he is doubling for, an effeminate homosexual who lusts after his stuntman. Because Jane is angry with Michel, she falls into the arms of a film producer, and arranges for Michel to re-do the same stunt over and over again endlessly. She also tries to woo Bruno the movie star and discovers that he is not interested in women. Michel tries hard to win her back, sometimes pretending to be the movie star, which confuses her to no end. Just as she is about to marry a dull aristocrat, Belmondo appears in an old gorilla outfit and abducts her from the aisles of the church. Belmondo was famous for doing all his own stunts, and he continued that tradition in this film. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

The thin plot that ties the story of Clara (Isabelle Adjani) and Bertrand (Thierry Lhermitte), the man pursuing her, to a newly-formed rock band is fleshed out by the young actors, several of them cafe-theater players making a transition to the "big screen." The actors play six young "twenty-somethings" in Grenoble who decide to make a go of otherwise routine lives by forming a rock band called the "Why Notes." The story opens with their trip to Paris for the weekend and closes with their coming home. In between, Bertrand is after Clara who has just abandoned her husband of a few hours. In the end, what happens "in between" may not be as relevant as the way in which the characters live, speak, and act. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Set in Paris, this romance centers on a pair of lovers who wrangle over whether or not they want to marry and have children. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The beautiful Helene (Catherine Deneuve) works in a hospital as an anesthesiologist and so when she accidentally hits Gilles (Patrick Dewaere) while driving her car, she can jump out and know exactly what to do to make sure he is not seriously hurt. The two start off a relationship based on this "chance" meeting, though the inauspicious beginning should have served as a warning. Gilles does not do very much except live in a room in his family's hotel and hang out. His lethargic approach to life is an anesthetic in itself, and since Helene is still mourning the death of her former lover a few years before, she is not overly anxious to start a new romance. The two of them go back and forth in a cat-and-mouse game until Helene tires of going nowhere and decides to leave for Paris. Considering how difficult it is for Gilles to rise to any action, it seems that Helene may remain alone unless she runs into someone else. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this routine romantic comedy, a veterinarian who mingles with humans of a higher pedigree gets an unwelcome visit from a female tax inspector -- and tries to seduce her as a way out of his dilemma. His screwball accountant's version of keeping books is no help, and so in desperation, the veterinarian performs a mock operation on the tax inspector's beloved pet dog in the hope of "saving the day" for himself in her eyes. Their continued interaction through thick and thin have changed the way the tax inspector and veterinarian regard each other, and disparate as they may be, an undeniable attraction starts to grow between them. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In a satire on family values that tends to pass off human cruelty as amusing, this story about an odd family of five children, a father, grandmother, and neighbor is not particularly laugh-provoking. When the mother of this "tribe" of five children leaves for good, their inept father is not sure how to keep the family clothed and fed, and without the help of his neighbor Simone (Josiane Balasko), he would be nowhere. She is attracted to him but eventually gives up on the relationship. Meanwhile, the father grabs his brood and they take off for Paris in search of the wife (after abandoning the body of the grandmother in a hospital corridor because they cannot pay for her funeral). Simone accidentally ends up on the same train to Paris, and out of generosity she puts the family up in her brother's apartment. Actually, her brother is now her sister because he had a sex change. The family records a song together that makes it to the top of the charts, and for good measure they win the lottery. With this change in fortunes, even Simone's relationship to the family may be affected -- especially since a respect for the integrity of women or the ability of men to run a household is never an issue in this nonsensical mish-mash. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Director Gérard Lauzier shoots diatribes at "liberals" from his own conservative perspective in this movie about a rebellious teenager leaving his bourgeois parents. Humor lightens the theme more than once, as when the besieged father -- after listening to a garbled harangue on Marx from his inspired son during a drive together, -- immediately seeks out motorists on the street to find out if he oppresses them. The son first rebels by moving upstairs to a maid's room and then moves out to stay with a supposedly "emancipated" family -- only to have everyone in the family try to seduce him -- brother, sister, mother, and father but not necessarily in that order or combination. Disillusioned, the son has to reconfigure his belief system and retrench. The salty French title of this film is typical of Lauzier's comic-strip humor, and his cartoon "Memoirs of a Young Man" provided the basis for P'tit Con. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Josiane Balasko ("the housewife's heroine") has been writing and directing good roles for herself since first entering the acting profession, and this film about a woman on the run is one of her early efforts. Anita (Balasko) has just about had it with life -- she is ready to kill herself when a neighbor (Isabelle Huppert) barges into her apartment to escape her abusive, policeman husband. After the husband is found murdered, both women have to take off rather than face possible implication in his death. Soon they are joined by Rico (Farid Chopel), also hiding out from the police after he was falsely implicated in the violent and tragic escape of a fellow convict. The two women and Rico manage to find a place to hide out for awhile, but life can hardly continue on like this for long. With a mix of comedy and anger, the protagonists try to come to grips with their fate. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide