Toute une vie

"And Now My Love" sums up the curious qualities of director Claude Lelouch. While his talents are in abundance he ultimately lacks the ability to pull it off. What has the makings of a classic in the final analysis can only be regarded as a failure.

In a masterly fashion, Lelouch deftly orchestrates the eventual meeting of a man and woman who destiny decrees should be together. It's a romantic notion that has been at the centre of numerous movies, but seldom so wittily and intelligently dished up as in "And Now My Love". The entire movie consists of the winding paths that the protagonists follow until their eventual meeting. Lelouch embroiders this process with historical fact, social criticism and much humor.

However the eventual meeting of the predestined coupling is something of a letdown. The chemistry simply isn't there. When the movie was first released it ended with this somewhat unsatisfactory finale. But despite the ending, the film as whole had enough charm to leave a favorable impression. However Lelouch must have been troubled by the poor resolution to his master work and in what can only be conceived as a desperate measure, he tacks on a truly ludicrous appendage, which instead of salvaging the film, completely sinks it.

His sci-fi ending is a disastrous artistic decision. Anything else would have been preferable. Unfortunately the DVD edition does not allow the option for viewing the edited version. So after well over two hours of much enjoyment one is subject to an ending which leaves a particularly bad taste.

I loved this film when it first appeared in 1974 and I had waited a long time to see it again. It was just as wonderful as the first time with a big caveat. Reviewers here mention the fact that the version of this film now distributed on DVD in the US contains content that was not part of the film's original release in the US in the 1970's. Someone at IMDb who knows a lot more about this than I do -- should clearly explain this in the capsule summary on the film's front page. To be precise, the ending of the film in the "unedited" or better, "re-edited" version includes a ghastly ending sequence that ruins the ending. The version shown in the US in the 1970's showed a view through the airplane's window that was perfectly timed with the beginning of the credits rolling. That view through the plane window was both under-stated, elegant, and wonderful enough that it was my most stirring memory of this film and I was sadly disappointed to find it gone!

See the subtitled version if you can. Lelouch weaves a wonderful, comic and tragic story covering most of the 20th century Europe. Within this global sweep, he traces the path of two people who are destined to meet. You see events from their grandparents' and parents' lives and then from their separate childhoods.

I have seen the film just a few nights ago.I agree that the futuristic part is enigmatic but it is also magic. Leloush couldn't give it up for the best reasons,and it is very dramatic to the story/legend that he is trying to tell us here. That part was taken at turkey,on the biblical site in the goreme valley, a cave town called the "The Witches Chimney's"- directly referring the Holocaust. Also, it is both futuristic & prehistoric land. This is the birthplace of nations in the bible. A place not far from Eden and Arrarat mountain. His point of view is panoramic and spectacular in that sense, and vital to the film which is an allegory before everything else. He points us the ongoing clash of traditions, nationalities,international politics and genders in one film which makes it a masterpiece to me. He also rewrites a totally different story of a man & woman, his classic, in historic context, only after 8 years.

I've loved this movie since I first saw it in 1974. I've been waiting to show it to my wife for years and was delighted to find it had been put on DVD. It went along wonderfully until what I had known as to be the end suddenly jumped into an additional 20 minutes containing a futuristic (for 1974) pessimistic segment of the story. Although it tied into an earlier scene in the film (also left out of the original release), it was easy to see why this had been left out (in the US at least)...IT WAS STUPID. Furthermore, it changed the entire context of the film. What had been a wonderfully romantic story showing how two people destined to find each other after the events of their lives have shaped them had now become some bizarre cut rate version of Soylent Green. Such a shame. At least when a movie like this is released on DVD they could have made the "unedited version" optional, as was done on the My Darling Clementine DVD. All it shows me is that the editor is usually right from the start and giving the director's a chance to re-cut their film does not always result in an improvement.