Catherine Deneuve & Nino Castelnuovo - Les parapluies de Cherbourg

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Depuis quelques jours je vis dans le silence
Des quatres murs de mon amour
Depuis ton départ l'ombre de ton absence
Me poursuit chaque nuit et me fuit chaque jour
Je ne vois plus personne j'ai fait le vide autour de moi
Je ne comprends plus rien parce que je ne suis rien sans toi
J'ai renoncé à tout parce que je n'ai plus d'illusions
De notre amour écoute la chanson

Since some days I live in silence
In the four walls of my love
Since you left, the shadow of your absence
Haunts me every night and eludes me every day
I do not see anyone, I made the emptiness around me
I do not understand anything, because I'm nothing without you
I gave up everything because I have no illusions
About our love listening to the song

Non je ne pourrai jamais vivre sans toi
Je ne pourrai pas, ne pars pas, j'en mourrai
Un instant sans toi et je n'existe pas
Oh mon amour ne me quitte pas
Mon amour je t'attendrai toute ma vie
Reste près de moi reviens je t'en supplie
J'ai besoin de toi je veux vivre pour toi
Oh mon amour ne me quitte pas

No, I could never live without you anymore
I can not, please, don't go, I'll die
A moment without you and I do not exist
Oh my love, do not leave me
My love, I'll wait all my life
Stay close to me, come back to me, I beg you
I need you, I want to live for you
Oh my love, do not leave me

Ils se sont séparés sur le quai d'un gare
Ils se sont éloignés dans un dernier regard
Oh je t'aim' ne me quitte pas.

They separated together on the platform of a railway station
They departed in a last glance
Oh I Love you, please don't leave me.

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Notes

 

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Cherbourg, a French town on the English Channel) is the main song of the eponymous film of 1964 of the French director Jacques Demy, an original experiment of a musical movie in which all the dialogues are sung.
A much loved movie and never forgotten. The interpreters were the young Catherine Deneuve (in her early twenties, he had already released movies 8-9) and Nino Castelnuovo, who had just interprted the part of Renzo in the historical TV drama The Betrothed for the Italian television.

The plot was very simple, Genevieve (Deneuve) seventeen year old daughter of a widow , who owns an umbrella shop (a very suitable item in the seaside town , where the weather varies greatly ) and Guy (Castelnuovo), a mechanic, loved each other dearly , but their love was obstacled by her mother , who considered her daughter too young and the guy not enough rich and not at his level . He leaves for military service (two years , at that time ) and she discovers she is pregnant . During the long wait, the girl is not comforted by any letter from him ( engaged in a war zone and unable for various reasons) and in the meantime the shop has problems and is detected by a young jeweler Roland, who has long been in love with Genevieve , and is willing to love her and raising a child that is not his . The wedding comes as a logical consequence, the store is sold and the new family leaves the town . When Guy finally returns from the military service is unable to find Genevieve and moreover his adoptive mother , with whom he lived, is dying. The girl who helped the mother , Madeleine , was already in love with him and the two , inevitably , get together and get married . Of course it does not end here , a few years after Genevieve casually back to Cherbourg and meets Guy , and this is the last , sad , scene: the two lovers realize how much love they had in their hands a time, and that happiness is lost forever.

It is therefore not the story itself, based on the clichés of melodrama and identifiable in advance and easily by viewers, for making this a memorable film. They were other factors: the extraordinary beauty of the images, the two beautiful actors (primarily Catherine Deneuve, gorgeous as ever), the proposition of non-trivial questions, such as the continuing importance of class differences in marital happiness, the opportunity for a young person (the protagonist is seventeen years old at the beginning, a teenager ) to understand and choose their personal path to happiness, and the responsibility for the adults (especially if they do not experience this happiness or have little known of it, as is the case of the protagonists of the film) to drive them toward wise choices, but that can preclude future happiness, the realism of the choices which then results in a regret for life; questions and issues proposed to the spectators using the themes of melodrama (or of the soap opera, we would say now) as "building blocks" of the story.

And finally, above all, there is a choice of language rarely attempted in a film in such a radical way: all the dialogue, without any exception, are sung, with an effect of deliberate contrast with the realism of the setting. Then it acquires decisive importance the beautiful soundtrack, due to the composer Michel Legrand, the favorite musician by the directors of the "nouvelle vague" of French cinema of the 60s, full of memorable moments and moods steeped in jazz.

 

A selection of images from the film Les parapluies de Cherbourg

Deneuve and Castelnuovo

Under: Genevieve with her mother (lAnne Vernon)

Michel Legrand with the soundtrack album (below)

 

The film in few images

 

Guy at work With a client

In Cherbourg, as always, it's starting to rain

Guy has finished, he's going home ...

... towards his simple house, where he lives with his adoptive mother

... who is assisted by Madeleine

Genevieve in her umbrella shop...

... sees Guy

A tender embrace

Between two persons that love each other

But it is urgent to come back to the shop

To Genevieve's mother

An evening at theatre for the two fiancée

And an evening in a dance hall

Genevieve has care of Guy

They're in love

Coming back ...

 

The thoughts of Genevieve

Coming back to their houses together

They go in Guy's home ...

But Guy has to start, his military service will be in a war zone

He send very few letters

And Genevieve is desperate, and also pregnant

While in the street Cherbourg's carnival is arrived Her mother is close to her

And, moreover, she takes a decision for her ...

Roland

Who loves Genevieve without conditions

The wedding

And also Guy finally comes back home

To Madeleine who always waited for him

Who loves him

And who gives him a son

An evening in winter, many years later ... at the gas station of Guy

The last, sad, encounter

 

 

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© Alberto Truffi 2006-2013 - Music-Graffiti / French lyrics by Jacques Demy (see Disclaimer) / Commercial use of lyrics and comments not permitted

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