Model Shop (film)
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''Model Shop'' is a 1969
romantic drama film Romance films or movies involve romantic love stories recorded in visual media for broadcast in theatres or on television that focus on passion (emotion), passion, emotion, and the affectionate romantic involvement of the main characters. Typica ...
written, directed and produced by
Jacques Demy Jacques Demy (; 5 June 1931 – 27 October 1990) was a French director, lyricist, and screenwriter. He appeared at the height of the French New Wave alongside contemporaries like Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut. Demy's films are celebrat ...
, starring
Anouk Aimée Nicole Françoise Florence Dreyfus (born 27 April 1932), known professionally as Anouk Aimée () or Anouk, is a French film actress, who has appeared in 70 films since 1947, having begun her film career at age 14. In her early years, she studi ...
,
Gary Lockwood Gary Lockwood (born John Gary Yurosek; February 21, 1937) is an American actor. Lockwood is best known for his roles as astronaut Frank Poole in the film '' 2001: A Space Odyssey'' (1968), and as Lieutenant Commander Gary Mitchell in the '' Star ...
and
Alexandra Hay Alexandra Hay (July 24, 1947 – October 11, 1993) was an American actress of the 1960s and 1970s best known for her roles in ''Guess Who's Coming to Dinner'', '' Skidoo'', and '' Model Shop''. Early life and modeling Born Alexandra Lynn ...
, and featuring a guest appearance by
Spirit Spirit or spirits may refer to: Liquor and other volatile liquids * Spirits, a.k.a. liquor, distilled alcoholic drinks * Spirit or tincture, an extract of plant or animal material dissolved in ethanol * Volatile (especially flammable) liquids, ...
who recorded the accompanying soundtrack. Demy made ''Model Shop'', which was his first English-language film, following the international success of his film ''
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg ''The Umbrellas of Cherbourg'' (french: Les Parapluies de Cherbourg) is a 1964 musical romantic drama film written and directed by Jacques Demy, with music and lyrics by Michel Legrand. Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo star as two young l ...
'' (1964). Aimée reprises the title role from Demy's 1961 French-language film ''
Lola Lola may refer to: Places * Lolá, a or subdistrict of Panama * Lola Township, Cherokee County, Kansas, United States * Lola Prefecture, Guinea * Lola, Guinea, a town in Lola Prefecture * Lola Island, in the Solomon Islands People * Lola (fo ...
''. ''Model Shop'' makes explicit the fact that Demy's films take place in the same narrative universe. It weaves together the plots of ''Lola'', ''The Umbrellas of Cherbourg'' and ''
Bay of Angels ''Bay of Angels'' (french: La baie des anges) is a 1963 French film directed by Jacques Demy. Starring Jeanne Moreau and Claude Mann, it is Demy's second film and deals with the subject of gambling. Costumes by Pierre Cardin. Plot Jean is a q ...
'' (1963).
Catherine Deneuve Catherine Fabienne Dorléac (born 22 October 1943), known professionally as Catherine Deneuve (, , ), is a French actress as well as an occasional singer, model, and producer, considered one of the greatest European actresses. She gained recogni ...
appears as herself on the cover of a coffee-table magazine in Lola's apartment.


Plot

In Los Angeles, 26-year-old architect George Matthews is floundering. He is unemployed and in debt, his live-in girlfriend, aspiring actress Gloria, is tired of him, and his car is about to be repossessed. Going round to friends to scrounge $100 to stave off the finance company, he sees a beautiful foreign woman in a white convertible and follows her to a mansion in the hills. On the street, he sees the beautiful woman again and follows her. She enters a model shop, a tawdry studio where customers can take erotic photographs, and he books a session with her, but she is uninterested in his attentions. When calling his parents, he learns that his draft notice has arrived, and he must report for Army duty the next week. For the first time, he comes face-to-face with his own mortality. At home, he finds that Gloria has landed a job with a new admirer, who is taking her out for the evening. Obsessed with the enigmatic foreigner, he returns to the model shop and books another session with her. She tells him she is French, named Cécile but working as
Lola Lola may refer to: Places * Lolá, a or subdistrict of Panama * Lola Township, Cherokee County, Kansas, United States * Lola Prefecture, Guinea * Lola, Guinea, a town in Lola Prefecture * Lola Island, in the Solomon Islands People * Lola (fo ...
, and recounts some of her problems. Abandoned by her husband Michel for a female gambler named Jackie Demaistre, she is trying to make enough money to return to France and her son. In a tender night of drinking and lovemaking at Lola's apartment, George and Lola talk of their failed romances, their dashed dreams, philosophy, and mortality. Through their conversation, they each find the willpower to continue living, and George gives her the money he had borrowed to save his car. The next morning, when George goes home, he finds Gloria packing to leave. He phones Lola, but her roommate tells him she flew to Paris that morning, having enough cash for a plane ticket. As they talk, a tow truck outside is removing his car. He tells the roommate: "I just wanted to tell her that I love her. I wanted her to know that I was going to begin again. It sounds stupid, I know. But a person can always try."


Cast


Production

Demy later told the ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'':
I came here for a vacation, not to make a movie. But I fell in love with LA. I just had to make a film. It's so marvellous. When I left Paris it was dead. Now I've missed the revolution and everything. But I had been so depressed, so discouraged. I said I must go someplace where something's happening. I don't want to be pretentious but I want ''The Model Shop'' to be ''Los Angeles, 1968'' – like Rossellini's ''
Europa '51 ''Europe '51'' ( it, Europa '51), also known as ''The Greatest Love'', is a 1952 Italian neorealist film directed by Roberto Rossellini, starring Ingrid Bergman and Alexander Knox. The film follows an industrialist's wife who, after the death o ...
''. Lola is a very small part. She ties the story together. Everything is like a puzzle: it fits together. I want to forget ''Cherbourg'', ''Rochefort''. I've gone as far as I can with that. I needed another language, new problems. This won't be a Hollywood movie. I told them I like to shoot on location, use real people whenever possible. The sound stage, big stars, big budget – I wouldn't enjoy that. I learned the city by driving – from one end of Sunset to the other, down Western all the way to Long Beach. LA has the perfect proportions for film. It fits the frame perfectly.
Demy initially wanted to have a new face in the leading role, and chose the then-unknown
Harrison Ford Harrison Ford (born July 13, 1942) is an American actor. His films have grossed more than $5.4billion in North America and more than $9.3billion worldwide, making him the seventh-highest-grossing actor in North America. He is the recipient o ...
. Columbia Pictures, however, had no confidence in Ford's abilities and demanded that Demy hire a more experienced actor.
Gary Lockwood Gary Lockwood (born John Gary Yurosek; February 21, 1937) is an American actor. Lockwood is best known for his roles as astronaut Frank Poole in the film '' 2001: A Space Odyssey'' (1968), and as Lieutenant Commander Gary Mitchell in the '' Star ...
was eventually cast on the basis of his performance in ''2001: A Space Odyssey''. Demy says Lockwood "had nothing to do in ''Space Odyssey'' but he knew how to move. He's very natural, very simple." Alexandra Hay was cast after Demy saw her in
Michael McClure Michael McClure (October 20, 1932 – May 4, 2020) was an American poet, playwright, songwriter, and novelist. After moving to San Francisco as a young man, he found fame as one of the five poets (including Allen Ginsberg) who read at the famous ...
's play ''The Beard''. She was under contract to Columbia, who financed the film. "Alexandra is a free bird", said Demy. "In a certain way she is like
Jeanne Moreau Jeanne Moreau (; 23 January 1928 – 31 July 2017) was a French actress, singer, screenwriter, director, and socialite. She made her theatrical debut in 1947, and established herself as one of the leading actresses of the Comédie-Française. Mo ...
... She has the same strong will. She will succeed because she wants to act. I think maybe
Bette Davis Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis (; April 5, 1908 – October 6, 1989) was an American actress with a career spanning more than 50 years and 100 acting credits. She was noted for playing unsympathetic, sardonic characters, and was famous for her pe ...
was that way too." Filming began in June 1968. Anouk Aimée did not arrive until four weeks into filming, well after she was expected. Rumours said that this was due to her affair with
Omar Sharif Omar Sharif ( ar, عمر الشريف ; born Michel Yusef Dimitri Chalhoub , 10 April 193210 July 2015) was an Egyptian actor, generally regarded as one of his country's greatest male film stars. He began his career in his native country in the ...
(Aimée was married at the time). Eventually, after Columbia Pictures sent her an ultimatum, Aimée arrived, and filming resumed. "I did Jacques's first film so it has to be that I do his first American film", said Aimée.
Carole Eastman Carole Eastman (February 19, 1934 – February 13, 2004) was an American actress and screenwriter. Among her credits are screenplays for Monte Hellman's ''The Shooting'' (1967), Bob Rafelson's ''Five Easy Pieces'' (1970) (for which she was nom ...
(under the name Adrien Joyce) wrote English dialogue for the film. The Los Angeles rock band
Spirit Spirit or spirits may refer to: Liquor and other volatile liquids * Spirits, a.k.a. liquor, distilled alcoholic drinks * Spirit or tincture, an extract of plant or animal material dissolved in ethanol * Volatile (especially flammable) liquids, ...
both appears in the film and recorded a soundtrack that was not released commercially for 36 years after the film appeared in theaters.


Reception

The film performed poorly at the box office. Demy's wife
Agnès Varda Agnès Varda (; born Arlette Varda; 30 May 1928 – 29 March 2019) was a Belgian-born French film director, screenwriter, photographer, and artist. Her pioneering work was central to the development of the widely influential French New Wave film ...
later said Demy "was less than happy with what Columbia did with ''Model Shop''. They killed it! I don't say it was the greatest picture but opening it in double features in the suburbs! Columbia really let him do what he wanted but he didn't get the point early enough: if you make a cheap movie they don't think anything of it." Critic
Jonathan Rosenbaum Jonathan Rosenbaum (born February 27, 1943) is an American film critic and author. Rosenbaum was the head film critic for ''The Chicago Reader'' from 1987 to 2008, when he retired. He has published and edited numerous books about cinema and has ...
views ''Model Shop'' as one of Demy's most critically underrated and neglected films, writing that "the play between actuality and artifice is the most complex and unconventional" in the film. Adrian Martin also celebrated the "still-too-little seen" ''Model Shop''. He notes how it is "keyed into the mild eventfulness of the ''fait divers'', undeniably emotional and momentous events happening to, or resonating within, derisory bodies that can scarcely support, transmit, narrate or pass on that emotion."
Ignatiy Vishnevetsky Ignatiy Igorevich Vishnevetsky (; russian: Игнатий Игоревич Вишневецкий; born September 5, 1986)Vishnevetsky, Ignati''Time Indefinite'': "A Talk with Sergei Loznitsa" ''Mubi'' is a Russian-American film critic, essayist ...
of ''
The A.V. Club ''The A.V. Club'' is an American online newspaper and entertainment website featuring reviews, interviews, and other articles that examine films, music, television, books, games, and other elements of pop-culture media. ''The A.V. Club'' was cre ...
'' is also a major proponent of ''Model Shop'', writing that Demy's film is "obsessively escapist" and that "every film emymade, whether it had singing in it or not, was essentially a musical; he could make the sad streets of Nantes into an MGM back lot.". In 2011, he included it in his "Cine-Autobiography", a list of unranked films which "opened doors or made imturn a corner.". Charlotte Garson notes how the films of Demy, as in the works of Balzac and
Proust Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust (; ; 10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist, critic, and essayist who wrote the monumental novel ''In Search of Lost Time'' (''À la recherche du temps perdu''; with the previous Eng ...
, create a universe in which not only themes but characters reappear. A few of the recurring motifs in ''Model Shop'' are chance making or marring relationships, lovers parted by war, women surviving by near-prostitution and the US as a world of sunshine where people drive open-top cars. Cécile is not only a character from ''Lola'', which also featured her husband Michel, her lover Frankie and her child, but was mentioned in ''Les Demoiselles de Rochefort'' as well. Another mention is of the gambler Jackie from ''La Baie des Anges''. ''Model Shop'' is included on ''
Sight & Sound ''Sight and Sound'' (also spelled ''Sight & Sound'') is a British monthly film magazine published by the British Film Institute (BFI). It conducts the well-known, once-a-decade ''Sight and Sound'' Poll of the Greatest Films of All Time, ongoing ...
''s "75 Hidden Gems" list. Films on the list were selected by 75 international critics as "unduly obscure and worthy of greater eminence". When promoting ''Model Shop'', Demy said he wanted to make an all-singing musical in the United States about students titled ''The Interview'', something that never materialised.


Legacy

A brief portion of the film is seen at the beginning of the season seven episode of ''
Mad Men ''Mad Men'' is an American period drama television series created by Matthew Weiner and produced by Lionsgate Television. It ran on the cable network AMC from July 19, 2007, to May 17, 2015, lasting for seven seasons and 92 episodes. Its fict ...
'' titled "Field Trip", when the character
Don Draper Donald Francis Draper, born Richard “Dick” Whitman, is a fictional character and the protagonist of the AMC television series ''Mad Men'' (2007–2015), portrayed by Jon Hamm. Up to the Season 3 finale, Draper was creative director of ficti ...
is shown watching it in a theater. The plot of the episode mirrors that of the film; Don is in a failing marriage with his actress wife Megan. Brief clips of the film are used in the music documentary ''
Echo in the Canyon ''Echo in the Canyon'' is a 2018 film directed by Andrew Slater. The film is produced by Eric Barrett and Andrew Slater under the banner of Mirror Films. The film stars Lou Adler, Fiona Apple, the Beach Boys, Beck, Tom Petty, Jackson Browne, Buff ...
'' to help set the feeling of 1960s Los Angeles. Los Angeles pop culture historian
Alison Martino Alison Martino (born December 15, 1970, in Los Angeles, California) is a writer, television producer and historian. She is the daughter of the late singer Al Martino and his wife, American Airlines flight attendant and model Judi Stilwell Martino. ...
named ''Model Shop'' "the inspiration for ''Echo in the Canyon''. Apparently the directors caught it playing on
Turner Classic Movies Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is an American movie channel, movie-oriented pay television, pay-TV television network, network owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in 1994, Turner Classic Movies is headquartered at Turner's Techwood broadcasti ...
. The filmmakers consider it particularly evocative of mid-1960s sensibilities. It definitely embodies the feel of that era. Perhaps that's why
Don Draper Donald Francis Draper, born Richard “Dick” Whitman, is a fictional character and the protagonist of the AMC television series ''Mad Men'' (2007–2015), portrayed by Jon Hamm. Up to the Season 3 finale, Draper was creative director of ficti ...
is watching this movie in episode 7.3 [of ''
Mad Men ''Mad Men'' is an American period drama television series created by Matthew Weiner and produced by Lionsgate Television. It ran on the cable network AMC from July 19, 2007, to May 17, 2015, lasting for seven seasons and 92 episodes. Its fict ...
'']". Quentin Tarantino has cited ''Model Shop'' as an inspiration for his 2019 film ''Once Upon a Time in Hollywood''.


See also

* ''Model Shop (album), Model Shop'', album by Spirit


References


External links

* * * * *
''New York Times'' Review 2/12/69
{{Jacques Demy 1969 films 1969 romantic drama films 1960s American films 1960s English-language films 1960s French films American romantic drama films Columbia Pictures films English-language French films Films directed by Jacques Demy Films set in Los Angeles Films shot in Beverly Hills, California Films shot in Los Angeles French romantic drama films