The Mother and the Whore (French: La Maman et la Putain) is a 1973 French film directed by Jean Eustache. Examining the relationship between three characters in a love triangle, it was Eustache's first feature film and is considered his masterpiece.
Plot[]
The film focuses on three twenty-somethings in an unconventional love triangle in Paris during the summer of 1972. Alexandre (Jean-Pierre Léaud) is an unemployed young man involved with both a live-in girlfriend Marie (Bernadette Lafont) and the Polish nurse Veronika (Françoise Lebrun). He had picked up Veronika at a café after an unsuccessful reconciliation with a former love, Gilberte (Isabelle Weingarten). With Veronika, he begins a desultory affair. Although Marie affirms her indifference to Alexandre's affairs, she quickly changes her mind when she sees how close he becomes to Veronika. This leads to a growing estrangement between her and Alexandre. The film focuses less on plot or narrative than on the confused and ambivalent life style of these three young people in post-May '68 Paris
Cast[]
- Bernadette Lafont as Marie
- Jean-Pierre Léaud as Alexandre
- Françoise Lebrun as Veronika
- Isabelle Weingarten as Gilberte
- Jacques Renard as Alexandre's Friend