La Piscine

A sumptuous setting, the reunion of an iconic showbiz couple in Romy Schneider and Alain Delon and the revelation of a nubile Jane Birkin led Jacques Deray’s film to instant success in France and around the world.

Jean-Paul and Marianne Leroy (Delon and Schneider) are writers enjoying a decadent St-Tropez holiday, where they spend most of their time lounging in their rented villa’s inviting swimming pool. Their idyllic existence is soon shaken up however, by the arrival of Harry Lannier (Maurice Ronet – Lift to the Scaffold, Plein Soleil) a close friend of Paul’s, who appears to have been intimate with Marianne in the past. He is accompanied by his 18 year old daughter Penelope (Birkin), a timid and awkward girl whose beauty attracts the attention of Jean. Under the beating sun, tensions between the four inevitably rise.

Deray’s thriller mixes a minimalist beauty with engrossing suspense throughout each minute of the film. With only a few other locations and actors, La Piscine centres on the four main characters and the titular swimming pool. Through the subdued performances, Paul Laffargue sumptuous yet measured photography and Michel Legrand’s eerie score, a constant disquiet infects the summer air as a growing hostility germinates between the Leroys and the Lanniers.

Delon and Ronet are reunited almost 10 years after Plein Soleil and once again the tension oozes between the two, with Delon’s brooding turn here of particular note. Birkin is terrifically enigmatic, while the film marked a turning point in Schneider’s career; no longer the innocent Austrian princess, she would go onto star in some of the greatest and hard-hitting French dramas of the 70s. La Piscine has all the elements of a classic and captures the feel of the swinging decade coming to an end in all its sexy glory.

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