Catherine Demongeot

(On Cable TV, April 2022) It’s always thrilling to find an older movie that plays like a far more recent one, and it would be easy to assume that Zazie dans le métro is much more modern than its 1960 copyright date. An all-out comedy that is never afraid to be absurd or nonsensical in its pursuit of laughs, it features a foul-mouthed ten-year-old girl as she travels around Paris, wreaking havoc alongside an ensemble cast of characters. But no mere plot summary can do justice to the fast-paced, anarchic gags that pepper the film. Owing as much to Looney Tunes cartoons as any other film tradition, Zazie dans le métro reaches a comic peak in a foot chase sequence in which the young Zazie tries to escape a pedophile (yes, you read that right – and it’s funny) while the film goes crazy around them, with a zippy succession of gags that escape physics and logic just for jokes. Not that the rest of the film is a slouch, with sequences set at the Eiffel Tower, or a slapstick fight destroying not just a restaurant, but the set of the restaurant. Louis Malle’s direction is self-assured and crazy at the same time, with a succession of short quick cuts that do much to make this film an honorary precursor of the spoof comedy genre of the 1980s. Catherine Demongeot is quite good and game as the titular Zazie, while an incredibly young Phillipe Noiret (unrecognizable without moustache if it wasn’t for the distinctive voice) is having a lot of fun monologuing atop the Eiffel Tower. Zazie dans le métro is a pure joy to watch, especially if you go into it expecting some kind of dull French Nouvelle Vague forerunner – it’s more Zucker-Abrams-Zucker than Truffaut-Godard. I expect to rewatch it soon.