L'Histoire D'Adele H.

The Story of Adele H. (France)

Films du Carrosse/Artistes Associes. Dir Francois Truffaut; Screenplay Francois Truffaut, Jean Gruault, Suzanne Schiffman; Camera Nestor Almendros; Editor Yann Dedet; Music Maurice Jaubert Art Dir Jean-Pierre Kohut-Svelko

Isabelle Adjani
Bruce Robinson
Sylvia Marriott
Reubin Dorey
Joseph Blatchley
Carl Hathwell

Francois Truffaut has made a romantic period drama about a young woman destroyed by her overwhelming love for a philandering British lieutenant.

She is the daughter of French writer Victor Hugo, the latter in political exile from France after he opposed the new Empire. Film begins with her arriving at a British channel island in 1863. She is looking for the lieutenant who had seduced her and whom she loved but who was looked down on by her family. She finds him but he refuses her and she sinks into madness.

She hounds him, announces their marriage and even follows him to Barbados. She is taken back to Paris where she lives out a long life, to die in obscurity.

Truffaut has gotten an exemplary performance from Isabelle Adjani as the anguished Adele H. The film builds a touching portrait and has a concise feel for the times, plus a needed timelessness in this impasse of reason and desire.

(Color) Widescreen. Available on VHS. Extract of a review from 1975. Running time: 97 MIN.

Variety is striving to present the most thorough review database. To report inaccuracies in review credits, please click here. We do not currently list below-the-line credits, although we hope to include them in the future. Please note we may not respond to every suggestion. Your assistance is appreciated.