Bonjour Tristesse

Director: Otto Preminger
Year Released: 1958
Rating: 1.0

Jean Seberg and David Niven live the easy life at a resort and spend their days idly swimming or sunbathing; if it was never explicitly stated that they were father and daughter, their constantly fondling of each other might suggest they were lovers (leave it to Preminger to make this so obvious - like Erich von Stroheim, who I compare him to, he likes adding some coded philandering to his films). Most of the acting is terrible and overdone - especially Mylene Demongeot as Niven's mistress - and the plot is as lazy as its characters, moving only when it needs to. Deborah Kerr shows up to try to knock some sense into the lot of them with her mature view of life - it contrasts with their hedonistic, live-for-today approach - but luckily for them she dies in a horrible car accident. Aside from some stylistic choices on Preminger's part (he shoots the flashbacks in color and shows the 'present' in black and white), I found it to be lacking in substance.