The Story of Adele H. (1975)

This is a true story about Adèle Hugo, the younger daughter of the famous 19th century French author Victor Hugo (1802-1885, best known today as the author of LES MISERABLES, which is causing an even greater stir now that the musical show has been filmed and nominated for several Oscars). She was named after her mother, who was also called Adèle. This is a passionate and intensely tragic tale which is well known to all cultured French people over the age of forty, who were educated in the days before the French education system collapsed into a pile of wreckage even more shattered than the rubble of the British and American education systems. (No French young person today who has not made extra effort even knows the names of the famous French authors and poets of the 20th century, much less their works, apart from the noxious and revolting Sartre, whose poisonous influence lives on like an ineradicable invasion of Japanese knotweed, choking all the good plants around it to death.) In this film, the 20 year-old Isabelle Adjani gives the performance of her life, a harrowing, wholly compelling and convincing study of a disturbed girl who goes from obsessive love into detachment from reality and thence into total madness. The real Adèle was by no means beautiful, as the photos of her exhibited recently at the Victor Hugo House in the Marais in Paris make clear. Adjani, on the other hand, is ravishing, and how the vain and narcissistic Lieutenant Pinson whom she adores can resist her is the only weakness to the film. The causes of Adèle's madness will never be entirely comprehended, as it was all too long ago (in the 1860s), but Francois Truffaut, who directed this miniature masterwork, hints at her being obsessively haunted by the death from drowning of her beautiful older sister Leopoldine at the age of 19. We see scenes of Adjani writhing in agony in her bed, in the grip of nightmares, calling out that they must not continue to keep Leopoldine's clothes preserved in her trunk at home. Is Adèle afraid of drowning? Is she touched by the terror of death? Does she feel suffocated by the fame of her father? Did she pick up from her father, as if by contagion, his own obsessive grief at Leopoldine's death? Or was she just born to madness? We shall doubtless never know. But having been seduced by the French Lieutenant (and this presumably also inspired THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN by John Fowles) and having given herself to him, 'by giving my body I give also my soul, and it is forever'. The guilt and, according to her faith, the sin, of allowing herself to be defiled in the flesh seems to have contributed to the resultant mania. Adèle then becomes manically fixated upon Lieutenant Pinson and follows him across the Atlantic to Halifax in Nova Scotia here his 16th Hussars have been stationed, and later still to the Island of Barbados in the Caribbean to which the Hussars were transferred. She thus became a primordial stalker, whose masochistic tendencies extended as far as paying a prostitute to go to Pinson, with a note to him saying it is with her compliments 'because you deserve all women'. As a study in female psychology gone wrong, they don't come more intense than this. Can one really blame the heartless Pinson for finding his cast-off mistress to be 'trouble' and wanting to escape her? Which came first, the casting-off or the mania? We do not know that either, nor will anyone. The film is made in a claustrophobic manner, with subdued colour, confined sets, and a darkness reminiscent of that found in all of Victor Hugo's own paintings, which lack all sunlight, and are extraordinarily gloomy, just as gloomy, in fact, as his house in Paris, with its dark 'Chinese Room' and even darker inner chambers, culminating in his funereal bedroom at the back. No wonder Victor Hugo's last words on his deathbed were: 'I see a black light!' This film is a searing emotional experience, largely because of Adjani's incredible performance, where one forgets entirely that she is Adjani and believes one is in the presence of the demented Adèle herself, robed in all her despair and bespangled with the glittering hopelessness of a mind which is disintegrating like an atom in a cyclotron, all before our horrified eyes. Truffaut made a quiet masterpiece, one which has all the qualities of Edvard Munch's silent 'Scream'. By way of epilogue I might say that there is an Adèle Hugo alive today, and she even has a charming sister named Leopoldine, who did not drown at the age of 19 but is still very much alive. They are great-grandchildren of Victor Hugo, two of the seven children (two sons and five daughters) of the famous French 20th century artist Jean Hugo by his second wife (he had no children by his first wife, also a famous French artist, Valentine Hugo, whose maiden name was Gross). And so the names live on and the family lives on, trailing their traditions and their creative works behind them in their collective wake like a convoy of ships which drops buoys to mark its route across the troublous seas of creativity.

"I'm still young and yet it sometimes seems to me that I've reached the autumn of my life." This tragic statement, taken from the diaries of Adele Hugo, daughter of Victor, is both the doomed statement of a young girl driven mad by love, and an ironic testament to the performance of a then 20 year old Isabelle Adjani. Francois Truffaut takes us back to 1863, with the American Civil War in full swing, and France and Great Britain still undecided in participation. Young Adele Hugo arrives at a camp in Nova Scotia seeking out her great love Lieutenant Pinson (Bruce Robinson), who she had embarked on a love affair with and whose potential marriage had been frowned upon.What may have become a rather frustrating depiction of a desperate woman in love, Truffaut takes special care to create an air of Greek tragedy, as we witness the emotional deterioration of our protagonist, and her desperate pursuit of the unwilling Lieutenant Pinson. Adjani, simply unnervingly beautiful (seriously, how do the French keep doing it?), gives everything to the role. Adele herself, as depicted in the picture, is a time-bomb of emotions, giving every ounce of her strength into the tidal wave of pure love she feels - possibly a result of her father's grand romantic poems and novels - so anything less from Adjani wouldn't haven't done Adele justice.This is a different kind of work to what I've previously seen from Truffaut - I'm more familiar with his New Wave productions. Adele H. is filmed in dark lighting, acting almost like a character itself signifying the darkness clouding in Adele's emotional torment. Victor Hugo's presence can be felt throughout the film, although he is never seen. Adele's story was taken from her diaries and the frequent letters she wrote to her parents, both of whom were concerned for her well- being. She attempts to keep her identity a secret, but friends are shocked when they uncover her secret, and the film works almost as a testament to Victor Hugo, a bow to his sheer immensity. But whether this is an ode to tragic intellectualism, or a human story that grabbed Truffaut's heart, I'll never know, but this is a gently haunting tale, and one that will make you want to personally open the eyes of Adele to the possibilities that are all around her, were she not so swept away by madness and love.www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

"The Story of Adele H." is an account based on the life of Adele Hugo, daughter of the great writer Victor Hugo, who led a tormented and difficult life in Halifax, New Scotia where she tracked down the man of her life, a military (Bruce Robinson) who after this desperate act of the woman decided to dump her away. Will she get over this guy? No, and the film shows us an obsessive woman (stalker if you prefer) that seems to love this guy with a power and ferocity that she'll do anything to be close to him.Putting together the word disappointing along with the name of the talented director François Truffaut is almost a sinful act, and I'll try to go in another direction, but considering the mind behind the movie one can almost say that. Compared to another of his works "The Story of Adele H." seems a minor work in terms of story. Truffaut's idea was amazing, he used some of the diaries of the real Adele and added something more to the story, but almost the whole film keeps on the same path and that is the obsession of a woman for a handsome womanizer as later we find out. There are some boring parts, other less interesting parts, but nothing so compromising. To female (and a few males I think) viewers Adele's story might be awful or something that makes of a beautiful woman a mere object considering the way she's treated by this guy and all of her attempts to make him fall for her, she throws herself into so many downer and sad levels, almost to insanity that I believe many people won't care about it. Of course you can say that she acts in that way because of the period this story is set (19th century), and nowadays women simply doesn't act that way no more, self-respect among them is beyond trying to reach attention of men. She's even more complicated (but not so dramatically complex) than Catherine of "Jules & Jim", a brilliant work from Mr. Truffaut of whom I absolutely love all of his films. Isabelle Adjani's performance as Adele is great, she makes the whole film interesting, she has a powerful presence on screen, guarantying a Academy Award nomination of Best Actress (losing the award to Louise Flecther in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"); Bruce Robinson who plays Adele's love is a good actor and as the woman says to her in some moments before he walks away from her: "You're beautiful". She's right about that, he's really all that!If the plot wasn't too much focused on the obsession and Adele's stalking this guy, I would have enjoyed more. But even a minor film from Truffaut is a giant film among plenty other films. 7/10

The Story of Adele H. is an interesting study about obsessive love, which inverts the customary roles by showing the woman as the predator and the man as the victim. Long before Basic Instinct and Fatal Attraction, there was Isabelle Adjani playing Adele Hugo, daughter of the famous writer, Victor Hugo, and completely crazy about Lieutenant Pinson, a man she's determined to marry or else ruin.There's not much to say about this movie. The story is quite simple and develops in an inevitable way, as happens when an inflexible personality collides with something she wants but can't have. As far as period dramas go, it's pretty but intimate; it's not the typical, flamboyant recreation of a lost time.In the end, all there is to talk about is Isabelle Adjani's powerful, unforgettable performance as the crazy Adele. It's a good thing she's in almost every scene of the movie. This is one of those rare instances when an actor manages to carry an entire movie on the shoulders. Adjani displays her insanity and intensity of feeling quite clearly thanks to her expressive eyes. It's well known that good acting is pretty much a matter of expressing emotions with one's eyes, and on that account Adjani is unmatched in this movie. One look at her eyes here and you'll see an inextinguishable fire burning inside her, that will eventually consume her sanity.I hadn't seen a François Truffaut movie before this one, and I can say I'm quite pleased with his direction in it. It was straightforward, unobtrusive. It gave Adjani room to display her talent. It's amazing to think that she was only 20 when this movie came out. She was just starting her career and yet showed more talent than many veteran actors. I'm a big believer that a good movie needs a good screenplay. But when that's lacking, I hope at least it has a good actor like Isabelle Adjani.