1949. Jacques Becker has left his wife for a bohemian life with a young, aspiring actress called Annette Wademant. He directs her to the Idhec film school and, thanks to a single writing exercise (a scene depicting an argument inspired by their daily life), unwittingly transforms her into a screenwriter who, several years later, will co-write with Ophuls no less than Madame de… and Lola Montès. Together with Wademant (who, at twenty years of age, devours Remembrances of Things Past), Becker settles down in an apartment belonging to Henri-Georges Clouzot and his wife, who had both departed for Brazil. It is from the conjunction of a happy but tempestuous life together and this literary revelation that Édouard et Caroline was born. The simplicity of this film, a unique cross between Italian Neorealism, American comedy and the quintessence of Fifties France, is equalled only by the rapidity of its creation: eight weeks of shooting between the 14th November 1950 and the 12th January 1950, as opposed to the twenty weeks that proved necessary for the demanding Rendez-vous de juillet; all the interiors were shot in the studio on just two sets; and the action was condensed into a few hours between 7pm and midnight. The slightness of the plot – a conjugal disagreement followed by reconciliation – was later to inspire the Young Turks of the nouvelle vague.

Charlotte Garson, Un film de femme, Tamasa Diffusion, 2013