AND GOD CREATED WOMAN (1956)

In St. Tropez, beautiful young Juliete (Brigitte Bardot) is an 18-year-old orphan who works lackadaisically at a bookstore but would rather flirt and sunbathe in the nude (she is described by one person as "shameless, impolite and lazy"); her frustrated adoptive mother is ready to send her back to the orphanage. Older businessman Eric Carradine, who ogles her but seems to realize that a romance would be out of the question, is trying to buy up land to build a casino, but is being blocked by the refusal of the Tardieu family to sell their shipyard. Antoine, the oldest son, returns to town to engage in discussions with Carradine but is against selling. Carrdine keeps upping his offer, and also suggests that Antoine marry Juliete to keep her in town. Though there are sparks between the two, Antoine suspects she would "put horns" on him fairly quickly. His brother Michel has been harboring a crush on Juliete for some time, and later, when the father dies, the sons agree to sell to Carradine in exchange for a stake in another shipyard, and Michel marries Juliete. They are happy for a short time until Antoine returns to St. Tropez to work at the shipyard. When Michel leaves for a day on business, Antoine and Juliete have sex on the beach. Both feel guilty, and when Michel returns, his mother (of all people!) tells him what happened. Juliete goes out to a bar and loses herself in orgiastic dancing; Michel follows with a gun. Against all odds, there is a happy ending.

This French film is known for being Bardot's big breakthrough in the United States—though she was 22 when she made this film for her husband, director Roger Vadim, she had already made some fifteen films. It is often derided as a bad movie, best appreciated as a mild piece of titillation which shows off the charms of both Bardot and St. Tropez, but actually as a sex melodrama, it's not that much different from such Hollywood films of the 40s and 50s, and seen now, many years after the initial brouhaha, it's still entertaining. Bardot is sexy and earthy and pouty, the very definition of a sex kitten. Her big nude scene, at the very beginning, will disappoint today's viewers; she is lying down on a towel, and when she rises, she is hidden behind a sheet on a laundry line. But she acts well, creating a character we are alternately drawn to and repelled by. Overlooked by most straight male critics, is the fact that the movie also has some nice male eye candy. The pouty, full-lipped Jean-Louis Trintignant (Michel; pictured with Bardot) who gets a shirtless scene, and the slightly older, sleekly handsome Christian Marquand (Antoine) who gets a wet tank top scene, are both quite sexy and give solid performances. All three are basically playing stereotypes but they make the characters rounded and easy to identify with. Curt Jurgens, who I associate with sinister roles (sometimes Nazis), is less dangerous here; we may not like his character, but he's not a villain. There really aren't any villains except maybe the adoptive mother, and the social worker who wants Juliete examined by a doctor for a "virginity certificate" (Juliete's reply: "Don’t worry, you’ve had your vaccine"). 16-year-old Georges Poujouly plays the youngest Tardieu brother, the one misstep in the movie; Poujouly is fine, but nothing is done with the character. Best line, spoken about Bardot: "Her ass is a song!" [TCM]