Regular Price $19.98

Starring: Melvil Poupaud,  Amanda Langlet,  Gwenaëlle Simon,  Aurelia Nolin,  Aimé Lefèvre, 
Directed By: Eric Rohmer, 
Rated: G (General Audience)
Release Date: 1996
Studio: Fox Lorber
Format: Color,  DVD-Video,  Subtitled,  NTSC, 

Editorial Reviews and DVD Information about A Summer's Tale

Amazon.com
The third of Eric Rohmer's Four Seasons romances follows the indecision of a young man who juggles three women during his final summer between school and work. Drifting along the beaches of Brittany while waiting for his commitment-shy girlfriend, Lena, to meet him, Gaspard (Melvil Poupaud of Diary of a Seducer) becomes fast friends with pretty waitress Margot (Amanda Langlet, the grown-up Pauline of Pauline at the Beach a decade earlier) and has a fling with Margot's aggressive and sexy friend Solene before Lena finally shows. By then, Gaspard has inadvertently committed himself to all three women. It's a lovely portrait of awkwardness and ambivalence set against the gorgeous land and seascape of Brittany, and populated by pretty young performers.

This, the most understated of Rohmer's sex farces, carries a bittersweet sting, but little of the emotional effervescence of his best films. While these characters are no less pretentious or vulnerable than his other lovers (who all seem to be emotionally at sea), Rohmer just skims the surface of their emotional revelation. His greatest achievement is the evocation of young adults caught between their teens and 20s, with little real experience but full of easily sidelined ideals. In the best Rohmer tradition, the circular conversations and solipsistic monologues are neither glib nor pretentious, merely the immature but sincere ramblings of vulnerable youth playing adult games. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews for A Summer's Tale

Rohmer's Summer Tale shimmers as brilliantly as the sun on the Breton sea.
Along with his Six Moral Tales, A Summer's Tale (Conte d'été) ranks among my favorite Éric Rohmer films. The 1996 French romantic drama is the third film in his "Contes des quatre saisons" (Tales of the Four Seasons) series, which also includes A Tale of Springtime (Conte de printemps) (1990), A Tale of Winter (Conte d'hiver) (1992), and Autumn Tale (Conte d'automne) (1998). A Summer's Tale stars Melvil Poupaud, Amanda Langlet, Aurélia Nolin, and Gwenaëlle Simon in a subtly-nuanced love story about a reserved young man, Gaspard (Poupaud), who travels to the small seaside village of Dinard in Normandy to rendezvous with his sort-of girlfriend, Lena (Nolin), who has a real fear of commitment. While waiting for Lena to arrive, and wondering if she will arrive, Gaspard befriends an intelligent, outgoing waitress, Margot (Langlet of Rohmer's Pauline at the Beach), while also becoming entangled in a fling with her tres-sexy friend, Solène (Simon). When Lena finally arrives, hapless Gaspard finds himself committed to all three women. At one point in the film, Margot tells Gaspard that she has watched him change from "lovesick" to a "clumsy Romeo" to "crafty" to "quite naughty" to "basically decent but crafty" in just two weeks. This bittersweet romance reveals Rohmer at his best. At age 76, Rohmer understands adolescent relationships. The Rohmeresque dialogue shimmers as brilliantly as the sun on the Breton sea against which the Summer's Tale is set.

G. Merritt



A Summer's Tale

One of Rohmer's best
Perhaps the best of Rohmer's season films. Gaspard (Melvil Poupaud) takes a month long vacation to a beach in Normandy, waiting for his more or less official girlfriend, the somewhat snotty Lena (Aurelia Nolin), to come. While waiting for her, he befriends the waitress and aspiring anthropologist Margot (Rohmer regular Amanda Langlet). Eventually, a relationship between the two develops, which seems to consists almost exclusively of long talks in the beach. But this is not all, since he soon also meets the somewhat promiscuous Solene (Gwaenelle Simon) in a disco. When Lena finally arrives to the resort, more than halfway into the movie, he finally finds himself in the position of having to choose one of the three. Rohmer would want us to think that Margot would be the best choice, and is difficult to disagree, since she's so charming and so willing to listen to him and even put up with him. It's amazing how Rohmer (who was in his late 70s when he directed this) is able to portray how young people talk and interact. The final decision by Gaspard was a bit of a disappointment, but it was probably the more realistic possibility.A Summer's Tale

A beautiful film...
"A Summer's tale" is the story of a young man and three women. All in all, not much happens, but I simply couldn't help finding this film engaging. The dialogues are beautiful, specially in some scenes, for example when one of the characters says that he can communicate well with others, but that he is not sure of being really himself when interacting with a lot of people.

The main character is a young musician named Gaspard (Melvil Poupaud). Gaspard doesn't know what to do, or whom he would like to be with. He thinks he is in love with capricious Lena (Aurelia Nolin), and goes on holidays to Dinard hoping to find her there. At Dinard, Gaspard meets a young waitress who also happens to be an ethnologist, Margot (Amanda Langlet). Margot quickly becomes his friend, and introduces him to Solene (Gwenaëlle Simon), an attractive and outgoing woman that Gaspard begins to date. Things become complicated when Lena arrives to Dinard, at the same time Gaspard is dating Solene and he realizes he has feelings for Margot. What can a charming but indecisive man do? Well, watch this film and discover it!

On the whole, I can say that I loved "A Summer's tale", the third film in Eric Rohmer's "Four Seasons" cycle. In a nutshell, it is beautiful film, the kind that makes you forget you are watching a movie and turns you into part of whatever is happening. I can only hope that "An Autumn tale" is nearly as good!

Belen AlcatA Summer's Tale

what a fresh french movie!!! I'm still in love with it!
I really don't have words to describe how sweet and delicated this movie is!!! I am still so in love with this movie; it can make me fly, just like in a dream... And the story is so real... Everyone can live a beautiful and modern story like that. When will I wake up from this fresh dream?A Summer's Tale

A very sweet story
Well, first of all i'm absolutely enchanted by the film. It's amazing how this script can be so simple and so interesting at the same time. Everything is perfect, specially the beautiful beaches of Britanny and the magnificient perform of Amanda Langlet as Margot.
There he was, Gaspar a young musician tourist, resting alone from his Maths studies in a paradisiac island dealing with cross-relations with three uncomparable women: Lena, wild beautiful but without any brain, Solene beautiful, determined and warm, and the lovely Margot, the most interesting character in the hole story, his friend and listener of his youth emotional confusions about the other two girls. I think Eric's design the Gaspar character as a perfect grown-up teenager...I don't believe how can a boy could not fell in love with a girl like the no less good-looking Margot. In fact she is very very beautifull...i confess i wouldn't resist to her charming presence.
My sincere congratulations to Amanda Langlet, you've conquered a big fan!A Summer's Tale