In 1912, Frenchman Jim (Serre) and the Austrian Jules (Werner) become firm friends, happily sharing their enjoyment of Paris, art, literature and women, even when their adoration of the divine but sometimes demanding Catherine (Moreau) looks set to test their relationship. Then comes war...

Truffaut’s adaptation – at once faithful and ebulliently cinematic – of Henri-Pierre Roché’s novel both celebrates its characters’ aspirations to unfettered love and acknowledges the social and psychological obstacles that conspire to undermine such dreams. Accordingly, energetic pre-war passions yield to a deeper awareness of responsibilities and needs: life, Truffaut reminds us, is seldom simple, happiness never absolute.

- text by Geoff Andrew, BFI