Because the English-language dvds on offer were either inordinately expensive or abysmally reviewed for their quality I had to get this film in Spanish, which I do not speak. It didn't really matter since its message is not conveyed through dialogue. It might well have been made in the silent era, and been just as powerful. I must have seen it in about 1977, and it has been unforgettable.If there is a flaw to this story, which doesn't affect its quality, it is that Pomme (or Beatrice ?) is surely doomed from the outset. The ending can be seen coming from the very start, and it's thrown into relief by the girl's feisty fellow-hairdresser, Marylene, who bounces back from any reversal.In any case, impossible to give it less than 10/10.

On the whole, the user comment by Dennis Littrell above is excellent. But even excellent comment may contain doubtful details. I do not agree that Pomme was proud and hopeful.When Francois visited Pomme at the mental hospital, she told him that she had had other lovers and had been in Greece with one of them. This was obviously not true. Then why did she say so? Dennis Littrell thinks that she was proud. I take him to mean that Pomme would give Francois the impression that she was quite capable of going on living without him.I cannot imagine that she could have such motives. Although SHE is the one who became sick when he abandoned her, and even so ill that she had to attend a hospital, HE is the one who "needs" support from two friend when he goes to see her, and HE is the one who cries (when nobody sees it). My conception is that Pomme even here revealed her good heart. She tried to make things easy for Francois – he should not need to have any feelings of remorse because of what he did to her.Moreover, I disagree that Pomme's face in the last shot shows a vague hope. I think that it reveals the greatest hopelessness.One Swedish reviewer wrote that things go bad when Francois lets Pomme remain at her own level, and they go bad when he tries to draw her up to his level. – But this is double nonsense. Things are excellent when he accepts her as she is. Moreover, Pomme is realistic. FIRST Francois must finish his study, and afterward they may see what they can do about her. At the present time they cannot even afford to go to the cinema without saving the money elsewhere.Much more important is the other side of the coin. Pomme would really love to be like Francois. In a bookshop she looks at the volumes with paintings by famous artists. But she cannot learn to understand such things without help. And the idea never strikes Francois that he might help her. He just scolds her for being as she is.There are several key scenes. In one of them Pomme is afraid of crossing a street full of motorcars. Francois had soon run over, and now he is standing there and shaking from impatience and irritation. The idea never occurred to him to take her hand and lead her over the street. And when she asks him what is the meaning of the word "dialectic", he gives her no reasonable answer.By and large, the idea of "sexual Samaritans" is unrealistic. Extremely few people are prepared to sleep with another individual toward whom they feel little attraction and expect no other gain. There are nevertheless a few unusual situations in which I would seriously recommend such things. Francois just throws Pomme away, giving no thoughts to the consequences. He does no even participate in the last meal, when he is at home in front of her and will drive her to her mother's home as soon as the meal is over.I claim that Francois did have enough personal strength to continue the relation a little longer, and to try to make the break more gradual and as little harmful to Pomme as possible. He could have seen her sometimes after she had moved to her mother, and he could sleep with now and then for a while.I do think that he had an amount of responsibility for her, and should have done something to help her overcome the breaking of their relation.

To revisit this exquisite performance from Isabelle Huppert is to forgive her the sleaziness of some of her recent choices. Like the other posters I have just read here this film - or rather this performance - has remained vivid in my memory since I saw it first on television some years ago. I bought the DVD in Paris last March and have just got around to playing it. Unfortunately it is offered without subtitles but dubbed into several languages so that any non-French speakers who have yet to see it will almost certainly lose out. There's one semi major hurdle to get over but when and if that is accomplished this is a semi-masterpiece. The film was made in 1977 and there is nothing to say that it is not also set at that time yet we have a pretty 18 year old girl who admits to being a virgin and a courtship which would do credit to a repressed English couple of the 1930s/40s/50s rather than a FRENCH couple in the 1970s. There is an equal lack of Passion between Huppert and Yves Benyeton, in fact Kevin McCarthy lookalike Benyeton is SO wooden we can't help wondering if he is REALLY a pod who somehow strayed from the set of Invasion Of The Body Snatchers on to THIS set. Throughout the acting of Huppert is Magnificent and leaves everyone else for dead. Huppert is not only one of the most beautiful but also one of the most Intelligent actresses working today and the way in which she suppresses her natural intelligence to play a colorless, unambitious, low self-esteemed teenager is little short of incredible. Goretta has chosen to end with a shot of Huppert looking straight into camera with a completely expressionless gaze reminiscent of Garbo in the last shot of Queen Christina. Whether by accident or design it's a comparison that Huppert can more than justify. One of the all-time great film performances.

This is a lovely film, although just too far divorced from any engaging melodrama to really sell itself. It's very up-to-date, urban backdrops and the distracting energy of the soixante-huitard creating another layer of narrative, largely to emphasise the split between the educated Francois (Beneyton) and Huppert's beautician Pomme. It's spiced up with a brilliant turn from Florence Giorgetti as the heart on (see-through)sleeve Marylene - whose lifestyle will Pomme choose, loving morally straightjacketed monogamy with Francois or philosophy shunning hedonism with all its frivolity and heartbreak?Michael Cimino used The Lacemaker to sell Huppert to the producers of the ill-fated Heaven's Gate - it was Huppert's inscrutability in role that Cimino wanted to put alongside Kristoffersen's all-American hero of the latter picture. One can't help thinking that Huppert may only have one gear. With the exception of, in fact, a feisty performance in Heaven's Gate and a comic turn in Chabrol's The Ceremony, riveting deadpan is her modus operandi. Here in The Lacemaker we get a premium balance of an acting range controlled beneath a surface which is as much to stop her passion bursting forth as to portray the modesty of her character. It's as good as it gets, but that's very good. 5/10