A few days ago Françoise Hardy, a fantastic girl, died. She was 80 years old and a long-term cancer undermined her until the end (she was an active defender of the right to euthanasia). But the women we have adored all our lives are never old to us. Although … The humiliation of old age and the ravages of illness wither them, and they remain suspended in our imagination in a timeless and salvific mercy. Françoise was a beautiful and luminous girl like those in Éric Rohmer’s films, who light up the screen. She was more famous as a singer-songwriter (‘Tous les garçons et les filles’ was a generational anthem in 1962, when she was 18) than as an actress. Her filmography, in fact, lacks memorable titles, but that matters little for the imprint of her memory.
And last week, Anouk Aimée, another wonderful girl, also French, passed away at the age of 92. If Françoise’s beauty was synonymous with freshness and youth, Anouk’s was deep, exotic, with a stunning elegance (I like that adjective of outdated showiness). I found him captivatingly attractive; one of those women that fascinates you to watch how they move or stay, look and speak.
Anouk Aimée has left some remarkable films for this timeless logbook. We certainly identify her with the love story she shared with Jean-Louis Trintignant in ‘A Man and a Woman’ (1966), characters that the director took up again on two more occasions, in the couple’s maturity and old age. But those films were by Claude Lelouch, who I find soft and cheesy. I don’t want to make my little film homage to the distinguished lady with those titles. I think I’ll evoke her in ‘La dolce vita’ (1960), by Fellini, with her presence in the Roman night, next to Marcello Mastroianni, as an enigmatic cosmopolitan princess, ambiguous and murky; with her black night glasses and a sensual elegance that goes far beyond her wardrobe. She was the style.
The news of her death almost coincided with the other day I was fantasizing, writing about it in a novel rework and talking about it with a friend, that Anouk Aimée could have been Trintignant’s partner in Haneke’s moving and hard ‘Amour’ (2012). Perhaps it was considered and Anouk had already retired. Emmanuelle Riva was perfect, but Anouk would have been a good nod, taking as a reference ‘A man and a woman’. Great characters are those of Haneke’s partner in this story of deep love that deals with self-respect (a link with Françoise and euthanasia) through a final dignity. Rest in peace Françoise and Anouk, two eternal girls.
#Argentina
