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“La Piscine” – Everyone into the pool [MOVIE REVIEW]
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Alain Delon in Jacques Deray’s LA PISCINE (1969). Courtesy: Rialto Pictures / Studiocanal
“La Piscine” (“The Swimming Pool”), a compelling French thriller from 1969, directed by Jacques Deray and adapted by Jean-Claude Carrière from a script by Jean-Emmanuel Contil, is being rereleased in a new 4K restoration.
Jean-Paul gazes around him, quietly adjusting his bathing suit, his hair, and his demeanor, all sexy bravado slightly overwhelmed by the self-doubt of someone recognizing his good fortune and doubting his place in the sun of this luxurious villa in the hills above St. Tropez. He lies at the edge of the swimming pool as he awaits the appearance of Marianne, his paramour. Bristling with sexual energy, the atmosphere becomes electric with her appearance. She walks confidently to his side of the pool and lies down. The atmosphere is charged as he toys with the strap of her bikini while she protests te
Your summer movie cocktail of sun-dappled desire with a splash of bitter provocation over ice awaits with the welcome restoration of the 1969 French film “La Piscine.” It’s two hours of beautiful people in tantalizing states of undress and unease that might just have you practicing your most chic mysterious chaise longue poses ahead of your next swim party.
Its director, Jacques Deray, is not a name typically associated with the classic French cinema of his time. But in a journeyman’s career beginning in the early ’60s that emphasized personality-driven crime sagas, “La Piscine” and its pressurized sexual tension showed he could pull off something cool and stimulating, menacing and modern, as savvy about what courses underneath real lives as it is distractingly gleaming on its luxe, seductive surface. (Though little seen in the U.S., its reputation was enough to inspire a remake in Luca Guadagnino’s underappreciated 2015 film “A Bigger Splash.”)