L'Important C'est d'Aimer

Fabio Testi and Romy Schneider

Andrzej Zulawski's L'Important C'est d'Aimer, from 1975, is a crazed melodrama derived from Christopher Frank's novel La Nuit americaine. Romy Schneiders stars as Nadine, a down at her heels actress who draws the romantic attentions of a scuffling photographer named Servais (Fabio Testi). Servais cobbles together a living shooting pornography and, behind a two way mirror, the occasional orgy which his mob employers use for blackmail. Nadine is ensnared in equally tawdry circumstances. Her husband, Jacques (Jacques Dutronc) is a louche parasite. He bailed Nadine out of a scrape years before and is now content to pimp her out for demeaning projects that pay the rent. Someone describes Nadine's most recent film as "two dykes in a castle with a dwarf."

A feeling of degradation permeates the film. The living quarters in the film are worn and shabby. The heat has been turned off, as has the phone. The dishes are piling up and so are the empty wine bottles. No one has a satisfying job and  the first blush of youth is long gone. "I'm 30" insists Nadine more than once, but no one believes her. Zulawski stresses his characters' sense of entrapment by largely keeping the action inside. The defining shot of the film is a shaky track down a cramped corridor. There is no exit.

All of this might be insufferable if not for Zulawski's twisted and very Polish sense of humor. This is a melodrama that flirts with. but stops just short of self-parody. Georges Delerue's magnificent score, which adds to this film's references to Contempt, apes the melodramatic music of Hollywood's golden era. That era is also echoed by the numerous classic film posters that decorate Jacques and Nadine's villa. The heroic ghosts of that era look down on a world that is now seamy and unsatisfying. Jacques, a jack of all trades, but master of none, has a side trade in dealing classic film stills.

Schneider and Klaus Kinski

L'Important... really goes off the deep end when Servais finagles a role for Nadine in a production of Richard III which features Klaus Kinski as the hunchbacked monarch. The production is a riotously enjoyable fiasco with Kinski frothing away in samurai armor. Kinski adds to the feel of polymorphous perversity by bedding two female prostitutes despite describing himself as a homosexual. Similarly, Jacques describes himself as gay, but it is intimated that he is impotent. That is only some of this film's romantic entanglements, deceptions, and tortured frolics. Whew. Offscreen, Schneider and Dutronc had an impassioned fling. 

The casting helps make the film. Kinski can upend any film with his eye rolling, incisor baring schtick, but he has an appropriately outlandish role here. Dutronc is superb as Jacques, providing soulful depths to a character who is hopelessly superficial and knows it. Fabio Testi is an almost comically limited performer, but Zulawski uses his broad frame well here. Servais is so besotted with Nadine that he is most often silently mooning after her on the sidelines and Testi can handle that. Servais' explosions of passion, not so much.

Like Servais, I am so smitten with Ms. Schneider, I can't hope to be objective about her performance. Her beauty has something to do with it, as does her sad and premature death. I think the role fits her like a glove, degradation and all, and that she is superb. The voters of the premier Cesar awards for best actress thought so, too, and selected her over an especially strong field consisting of Isabelle Adjani (...Adele H), Delphine Seyrig (India Song), and Catherine Deneuve (Lovers Like Us). Maybe they were trying to boost a falling star, but I appreciate the sentiment. 

L'Important C'est d'Aimer is not a film for everyone. If you are offended by explicit sex, drug use, violence, cruelty to women or Klaus Kinski chewing the scenery, steer clear. However, it is a prime example of the bonkers cinema of Andrzej Zulawski and his principle theme, summed up in the title of one of his films, mad love. Streaming on Kanopy for free and on Apple TV for a fee.

Jacques Dutronc and Schneider