Calmos
Encyclopedia
Calmos is a 1976 French film directed by Bertrand Blier
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) who recalls them to life's simple pleasures. Calm, that's what they want. But soon their example inspires thousands of disorientated males, fleeing the feminist 1970s. Soon too there arrives a squadron of nymphomaniac amazons
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reviewed the film in The New Yorker
: "Blier's method worked in Les Valseuses
, and it works in Préparez Les Mouchoirs
, but something went wrong in his sexual extravaganza Calmos (and the picture failed, even in France)...The two men are joined by other escaping men; women demanding gratification come after them with guns, and it's a full-scale tedious war of the sexes until, finally, the two pals, old men now and shrivelled in size, are dropped out of a cloud onto an island...Calmos is an overscaled back-to-the-womb satiric fantasy - a male daydream about the impossibility of escape from the sexual wars..It's about the demands of sex on men who spent their youth chasing women and now - jaded - want a break from it - they want to go off and live like pigs. It's a funny idea, and though Calmos abandons it, there are still things to look at all through the picture...Throughout the women are made repellently beautiful - they have a neon voraciousness. Brigitte Fossey
, a blond cat with a perfect tiny mouth, is like sensual porcelain. No one but Blier has matched such raunchiness and such visual beauty; you have to have a true respect for raunchiness to do that."
Bertrand Blier
Bertrand Blier is a French screenwriter and film director.Born in Boulogne-Billancourt, France. He is the son of Bernard Blier....
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Plot
Two men, fortyish, worn out by their wives, abandon everything to go and live in the back of beyond. There they meet a truculent priest, a boozer, Émile (Bernard BlierBernard Blier
Bernard Blier was a French character actor. His rotund features and premature baldness allowed him to often play cuckolded husbands in his early career. He proved to be one of France's most versatile and sought-after character actors, performing interchangeably in comedies and dramas...
) who recalls them to life's simple pleasures. Calm, that's what they want. But soon their example inspires thousands of disorientated males, fleeing the feminist 1970s. Soon too there arrives a squadron of nymphomaniac amazons
Amazons
The Amazons are a nation of all-female warriors in Greek mythology and Classical antiquity. Herodotus placed them in a region bordering Scythia in Sarmatia...
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Cast
- Jean-Pierre MarielleJean-Pierre MarielleJean-Pierre Marielle is a French actor. He has played in more than a hundred movies in which he brought life to a very large diversity of roles, from the banal citizen , to the serial killer , to the World War II hero , to the compromised spy , to the has-been actor Jean-Pierre Marielle (born...
as Paul Dufour, a gynaecologist - Jean RochefortJean RochefortJean Rochefort is a French actor, with a career that has spanned over five decades.Rochefort was born in Paris, France. He was educated at the Lycée Pierre Corneille in Rouen He was 19 years old when he entered the Centre d'Art Dramatique de la rue Blanche. Later he joined the Conservatoire National...
as Albert - Bernard BlierBernard BlierBernard Blier was a French character actor. His rotund features and premature baldness allowed him to often play cuckolded husbands in his early career. He proved to be one of France's most versatile and sought-after character actors, performing interchangeably in comedies and dramas...
as the priest, Émile - Brigitte FosseyBrigitte FosseyBrigitte Fossey, born in Tourcoing, Nord, is a French actress.-Early years:The daughter of a schoolteacher, Fossey was five years old when she was cast by director René Clément to star in his film, Forbidden Games. Fossey played the role of an innocent child orphaned by World War II...
as Suzanne Dufour
Critical reception
Pauline KaelPauline Kael
Pauline Kael was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. Earlier in her career, her work appeared in City Lights, McCall's and The New Republic....
reviewed the film in The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
: "Blier's method worked in Les Valseuses
Les Valseuses
Going Places is a 1974 French comedy-drama film directed by Bertrand Blier, adapted from a novel by Blier, and starring Miou-Miou, Gerard Depardieu and Patrick Dewaere. The French title translates into English as "The Waltzers", a French vulgar term for the testicles. The film had a total of...
, and it works in Préparez Les Mouchoirs
Get Out Your Handkerchiefs
Get Out Your Handkerchiefs is a 1978 French romantic comedy film directed by Bertrand Blier. The film received the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film at the 51st Academy Awards. The film had a total of 1,321,087 admissions in France. -Plot:...
, but something went wrong in his sexual extravaganza Calmos (and the picture failed, even in France)...The two men are joined by other escaping men; women demanding gratification come after them with guns, and it's a full-scale tedious war of the sexes until, finally, the two pals, old men now and shrivelled in size, are dropped out of a cloud onto an island...Calmos is an overscaled back-to-the-womb satiric fantasy - a male daydream about the impossibility of escape from the sexual wars..It's about the demands of sex on men who spent their youth chasing women and now - jaded - want a break from it - they want to go off and live like pigs. It's a funny idea, and though Calmos abandons it, there are still things to look at all through the picture...Throughout the women are made repellently beautiful - they have a neon voraciousness. Brigitte Fossey
Brigitte Fossey
Brigitte Fossey, born in Tourcoing, Nord, is a French actress.-Early years:The daughter of a schoolteacher, Fossey was five years old when she was cast by director René Clément to star in his film, Forbidden Games. Fossey played the role of an innocent child orphaned by World War II...
, a blond cat with a perfect tiny mouth, is like sensual porcelain. No one but Blier has matched such raunchiness and such visual beauty; you have to have a true respect for raunchiness to do that."