The Mother and the Whore

The Mother and the Whore French La Maman et la Putain is a 1973 French film directed by Jean Eustache. An examination of the relationships between three characters in a love triangle, it was Eustaches first feature film and is considered his masterpiece.

In 1972 Eustache had begun to doubt his career in films and contemplated quitting the business. He told a reporter from Le Nouvel Observateur If I knew what it was that I wanted, I wouldnt wake up in the morning to make films. Id do nothing, Id try to live without doing or producing anything. Soon afterwards he got a new idea for a film to make with his friends JeanPierre Laud and Bernadette Lafont he also brought in his exlover Franoise Lebrun who at that time was a literature student and had never acted before. Eustache was loaned money from friend Barbet Schroeder to spend three months writing the script, which was over three hundred pages. Although the film often seems to be highly improvised, every word of dialogue was written by Eustache. The film was very autobiographical and was inspired by Eustaches various relationships, such as his then recent breakup with Franoise Lebrun and romantic relationships with Marinka Matuszewsk and Catherine Garnier. Many of the locations used in the film were places that Garnier had lived or worked. The character played by Jacques Renard was based on Eustaches friend JeanJacques Schuhl.The film was shot between Mayand July 11, 1972. on a budget of 700,000 francs. Eustache called it a very hostile film, and it mostly consisted of dialogues and monologues about sex. Eustache says that the character Alexandre is destroying the three lead characters, but he is looking for it all along. After his voyage into madness and depression, he ends up alone. Thats when I stop the film. Filming locations included Les Deux Magots Caf, the Caf de Flore, the Caf le SaintClaude, the Laennec Hospital, the Blue Train restaurant and inside various apartments on the Rue de Vaugirard and Rue Vavin. The film had no musical score and only used natural sounds and occasionally music played by the characters on phonographs, such as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Edith Piaf, Marlene Dietrich and Deep Purple. ........

Source: Wikipedia