Sightlines · reception
How The Young Girls of Rochefort was received
1967 · Jacques Demy · The Young Girls of Rochefort on Sightlines
The arc
Received in 1967 as the lighter, more 'artificial' follow-up to The Umbrellas of Cherbourg — charming but slight was the verdict — it's since been fully canonized, helped along by the 1990s restoration overseen by Agnès Varda and a new generation who discovered it via La La Land. Now it's routinely called one of the most joyful films ever made.
What’s debated
The eternal Demy debate: is Rochefort's sun-drunk exuberance actually richer than Cherbourg's heartbreak, or is it the beautiful-but-lesser sibling — and is all that pastel joy hiding something much sadder underneath?
Its footprint
The twins' song ('Nous sommes deux sœurs jumelles...') and the candy-coloured streets of Rochefort are endlessly referenced — most visibly by La La Land, which borrows its palette, its ensemble numbers, and its whole spirit. The town of Rochefort still celebrates the film as its claim to fame.
Where it stands
A Criterion and Letterboxd darling — the 'happiest film ever made' slot in the canon, and the standard prescription when someone asks cinephiles for pure joy on screen.
Did you know? The twins are played by real-life sisters Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Dorléac — their only major film together, made all the more poignant because Dorléac died in a car accident just months after the film's release.
Named by the director
- Gene Kelly — Demy openly idolized Kelly and the MGM musical tradition, and cast him in the film as a living homage to it.