Jacques Demy was a profoundly fascinating figure when it came to his directorial output. One of the defining figures of the French New Wave, he never quite stood in the same thematic territory as some of his contemporaries, with his work being incredibly unique, and idiosyncratic to the point where no filmmaker has ever managed to quite do exactly what he did. One of his most endearing films is The Young Girls of Rochefort (French: Les Demoiselles de Rochefort), an ambitious musical comedy that borrows from innumerable sources of culture, becoming almost a tissue of inspirations, all derived from the director’s insatiable desire to explore so many different ideas, compacting them into a single visionary work that takes the viewer on a journey into the human spirit, where life and its many wonderful quirks are celebrated with vigour, vivacity and immense amounts of heart. It isn’t surprising that this film has come to be seen as one of the defining works of French cinema, not only because it stands apart from the more self-indulgent, philosophically-centred existential dramas that some of his contemporaries attempted to convince us to being meaningful glimpses into the human psyche, but also because few films manage to be as upbeat and poignant as this – and add to the joyful nature a keen sense of social commentary, one that holds far more weight than the effervescent appearance of this film would lead you to believe, and you have quite possibly the happiest film of its era.

The best way to describe The Young Girls of Rochefort is as pure happiness distilled into two hours of unhinged escapist cheer. It’s certainly difficult to not be charmed by this incredibly entertaining film – from the first moments when the fair arrives in the small town of Rochefort, and the carnies dance through the landscape, you’re immediately transported to this almost mythical vision of the town, one that has its roots firmly in reality, but its intentions far above, where the only guiding principle that seems to be governing this film being the aim of taking us on some form of riveting metaphysical journey, one where the confines of what cinema is normally represented as are challenged, eviscerated in favour of a storyline that may not be as plausible as some of the work done by Demy’s peers, but still carrying the gravitas of looking into one aspect of the human condition, just this time it’s the more upbeat moments that the director is seeking to exploit through this marvellous musical. The pluvial joyfulness of The Young Girls of Rochefort is truly enchanting, and the approach to the material, whereby Demy is sampling from the extravagant Hollywood musicals that clearly inspired this stupendous work, and combining it with a sense of social cohesion, whereby it isn’t merely just hoards of enthusiastic townsfolk gallivanting through the cobblestone streets, is simply beyond remarkable. Unrestrained merriment trickles into every frame of this film, and the director provides so much detail, both in form and content, to qualify this as one of the most exuberant forays into the nature of life, the kind of gleeful existential masterpiece we didn’t know we needed.

There’s an incredible depth to The Young Girls of Rochefort that is visible right from the outset – in between the joyous songs and gorgeous dance sequences, there’s a storyline that complements the visual splendour in quite unexpected ways – the story of two twins (played by real-life sisters Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Dorléac), who are growing weary of their banal existence in the quaint seaside town, and find the arrival of a group of globetrotting carnival folk the exact escape they need – is the catalyst for a profoundly entertaining series of vignettes that are far more than just supplementary to the spectacle. We are witness to the intersecting stories of the humble townspeople and the visitors they welcome with rigorous acceptance – Rochefort is portrayed as a town where even the most melancholic of its inhabitants are expressive and buoyant, traversing the streets with heartfelt jubilation that gives context to their trials and tribulations, rather than contradicting it. Misery has absolutely no place in this film, which creates an atmosphere of utmost delight, and where the deeper meanings that underpin this story, whether in the more traditional elements of the plot or the broader existential concepts, are investigated through the lens of magical escapism. Demy places this film on the nexus between glee and more serious matters, which he explores with an intricate sense of fascinating that pervaded all of his work and made each one of his films memorable works that find themselves harbouring much more meaning than what they’d normally be required to, creating sincere, eloquent social dramas in the form of beautifully triumphant, lavish visual masterpieces.

Demy wasn’t only a great visual stylist, but an actor who could extract remarkable performances from his cast, with many of his collaborators doing some of their most interesting work while under his direction. The Young Girls of Rochefort finds Demy working with a terrific ensemble of cross-continental stars, some of them ingénues having their careers shaped by this incredible showcase, others veterans working with the acclaimed director as a way of developing on the skills that made them such enduring cinematic figures in the first place.  Catherine Deneuve and Françoise Dorléac head the cast, playing the titular characters, a pair of young women disillusioned with their small-town existence, yearning to find their way to Paris, and hopefully lead the artistic bohemian life they have always dreamed of experiencing. Every other character weaves through their story in some way – American dancers George Chakiris and Grover Dale are the catalysts for their eventual migration from Rochefort, with the overtures of romance being particularly strong in the chemistry between the two pairs, who trot across the screen with a blend of reckless abandon and fierce passion. Cinematic legend Danielle Darrieux plays the girls’ mother, a lonely woman who regrets rejecting the advances of a man due to something as inconsequential as his ridiculous name, and now yearns for that loving touch one again, being unaware that Simon Dame, played by the incomparable Michel Piccoli, is only a few streets away. The classical Hollywood influences on The Young Girls of Rochefort are so profound, Demy even manages to wrangle Gene Kelly into a small supporting role – and the moment he appears on screen, he lights it up with the otherworldly charm that only the great stars of the Golden Age seemed to possess.

However, regardless of the magnitude of the people who pass through the lens of his camera, Demy always affords them all the opportunity to do something special, and this is precisely what gives The Young Girls of Rochefort its beautifully poetic tone, which sits atop many different genres, some of them more prominent than others. The director puts together a magnificent expression of exuberance, romance and celebratory joy, which he contrasts with some more subversive tones – consider the scene in the coffee shop that occupies a pivotal role in the film, and where a group of characters lament upon a recent axe-murderer, all entirely through song, as they relay the details of this grisly crime with the same enthusiasm and charm as they do when singing about falling in love. It’s this somewhat experimental approach that makes The Young Girls of Rochefort such an interesting work – it goes beyond the confines of the musical comedy, which are normally bold and entertaining, but often tend to prioritize the spectacle rather than any discernible message, which Demy seems to be commenting on here. The film could never be seen as convoluted – the director deftly navigates the complex thematic territory in such a way that we don’t even notice it until we’re directly in contact with it – but rather a bundle of fascinating ideas strewn together in a marvellous fashion. There’s not a single moment of inauthenticity to be found anywhere in The Young Girls of Rochefort, which is remarkable for a film that is built almost entirely from a long ancestral line of musicals and light melodramas, in which heightened emotion was not uncommon.

On nearly every level, this film is a contradictory masterwork that managed to work in the realms of both bold expressivity and incredible restraint. This is most evident in how Demy brings this film to life – resisting the urge to simply to bolster the scope of the film to the point where its almost revolutionary, the director rather chooses to employ all the resources available but to exercise them in a meaningful way, rather than splashing every broad cinematic convention into the film. The use of colour is incredibly prominent throughout the film, with Ghislain Cloquet’s camera capturing every detailed hue, creating a mesmerizing visual landscape that leaves just as much an impression on the viewer as the poignant story. The Young Girls of Rochefort isn’t only a gleeful film in terms of its tone and premise but also bursts through as one of the most gorgeous musicals of its era, a purely unhinged expression of nothing but bold colour and dazzling perceptible poetry. The effort that went into building this film and giving it the nuance it exhibits is fascinating and contrasts particularly well with a storyline that benefits massively from such an intricately beguiling expression of nothing but the most earnest delights. The various components of this film collide to create a euphoric atmosphere of nothing but sheer prepossessing beauty, and it would be a challenge to find a musical that contains such irresistible dance sequences. It’s a feature of the classic musical for the story to be built around broad sequences, but The Young Girls of Rochefort defies this by balancing both with equal aplomb, leading to an arresting experience that is almost unprecedented in both scope and intention.

The Young Girls of Rochefort is quite simply sensational – an engaging musical with an earnest joie de vivre and fascination with deeper topics, that work in conjunction with the compelling use of colour and music, not as a supplement, but rather create a symbiotic relationship between the various components. Pure joy radiates from this film, with Jacques Demy once again going in pursuit of something thoroughly original, exercising both his fascination with deeply human stories, and his exuberant love for broad musicals, from a time in which escapism wasn’t used as a term of derision, but rather as the highest praise a film could receive. Sentimental without being saccharine, and intelligent without becoming self-indulgent or preoccupied with its own profundity (as was the case for other films made during this era), The Young Girls of Rochefort is a charming foray into the human condition from the perspective of the boldest, most celebratory form of storytelling, the large-scale musical. Every moment of this film is plucked from the endless imagination of one of cinema’s most unheralded auteurs and carefully placed in the context of this beautifully poetic story, in which the deviations of the soul and the passions of the heart are used as a tool to explore some incredibly complex themes without resorting to overwrought melodrama. Ultimately, whether you view The Young Girls of Rochefort as a charming musical that seeks to represent nothing more than unbridled joy, or as a challenging subversion of popular conventions, where the social commentary is embedded beneath many layers of chaotic exuberance, there’s absolutely no doubt that Demy made nothing short of a masterpiece. There was a smile that crept its way onto my face and refused to subside for the entirety of this film – if that isn’t an indication of a great film, then absolutely nothing else is.