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A Very Curious Girl

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A Very Curious Girl
Directed byNelly Kaplan
Screenplay byNelly Kaplan
Claude Makovski
Jacques Serguine
Michel Fabre
Produced byMoshé Mizrahi
StarringBernadette Lafont
Georges Géret
CinematographyJean Badal
Edited byNelly Kaplan
Music byGeorges Moustaki
Release date
  • 3 December 1969 (1969-12-03) (France)
Running time
106 minutes
CountryFrance
LanguageFrench

A Very Curious Girl (French: La Fiancée du pirate) is a 1969 French comedy-drama film directed, edited and co-written by Nelly Kaplan.[1] [2][3] Other English titles are Dirty Mary and Pirate's Fiancée.[4][5]

Plot

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Marie is a young woman who lives in sheer poverty in the fictional village and commune of Tellier (an allusion to La Maison Tellier) with her mother, a woman of obscure origins suspected to be a Romanichel sorcerer, and her pet buck. Marie and her mother are despised by the locals although Marie is also a sexual object for them, including her lesbian boss Irène.

When her mother dies after a hit-and-run accident, Marie refuses to allow the local priest to giver her a Christian burial, citing the mistreatment to which the church and people of Tellier had subjected them both. Instead, she convinces several of the townspeople to bury her mother outside the small shack they share on Irène's farm and decides to take revenge on those people who take advantage of her.

She begins sleeping with many of the townsfolk in exchange for money, becoming relatively wealthy (compared to her previous meagre living situation) while garnering social and political influence. At the same time, she grows closer to André, a travelling projectionist. Throughout the film, Marie uses her influence to unmask the hypocrisy and selfishness of the people of Tellier, in particular its patriarchal male characters.[6]

Cast

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Score

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Georges Moustaki's soundtrack was released in the same year as the film.[4]

  1. Histoire du Cirque (1:22)
  2. Duo (2:21)
  3. La Mort (2:08)
  4. Pierre et Nicole (2:44)
  5. Thème de Franca (1:37)
  6. A Lisbonne (fado) (1:37)
  7. Retour à L'hôtel (2:18)
  8. Le Scandale / Suite (11:40)
  9. Mona (1:31)
  10. Anne et Claude au Musée (2:27)
  11. Le Désespoir de Muriel (3:52)
  12. La Déclaration d'Amour (2:25)
  13. La Rupture (3.46)
  14. Epilogue (2:25)
  15. Une Petite Ile (1:30)
  16. Anne et Claude (2:05)
  17. Moi, Je Me Balance (2:46)
  18. Marche de Marie (2:35)

Critical reception

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The New York Times listed A Very Curious Girl as one of Bernadette Lafont's most notable films.[7] The website filmfanatic.org put this film into the category "Foreign Gem".[8] The Guardian mentions "A curious girl" in her obituary and states Lafont's performance had been "brilliant".[9]

References

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  1. ^ "La fiancée du pirate". virtual-history.com. Retrieved 2013-07-26.
  2. ^ "A very curious girl". unifrance.org. Retrieved 2013-07-26.
  3. ^ "Nelly Kaplan's English Biography". oswego.edu. Retrieved 2013-07-27.
  4. ^ a b "Fiancée Du Pirate, La (1969)". soundtrackcollector.com. Retrieved 2013-07-26.
  5. ^ "Pirate's Fiancée". screenrush.co.uk. Retrieved 2013-07-26.
  6. ^ Kaplan, Nelly (director) (3 December 1969). La Fiancée du pirate [A Very Curious Girl] (Motion picture) (in French). France.
  7. ^ Knorr, Katherine (1997-11-15). "Bernadette Lafont:Unwinding the Reels". The New York Times. Retrieved 2013-07-26.
  8. ^ "Very Curious Girl, A (1969)". filmfanatic.org. Retrieved 2013-07-26.
  9. ^ Bergan, Ronald (2013-07-26). "Bernadette Lafont obituary". The Guardian. Retrieved 2013-07-27.
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