The Old Sorceress and the Valet (Julius-Amédée Laou, 1987)

Robert Liensol and Jenny Alpha in The Old Sorceress and the Valet

Cast: Jenny Alpha, Robert Liensol, Christine Amat, Jean-François Perrier, Jean-Claude Fal, Sophie Pal, Jacques Martial, Jean-Claude Dreyfus, Roger Lemus, Jean-Marie Retby. Screenplay: Julius-Amédée Laou. Cinematography: Jean-Paul Miotto. Film editing: Sophie Chailley, Tamara Pappe. Music: Leona Gabrielle, Ernest Léardée, Jean-Claude Mejstelman, Stellio. 

Julius-Amédée Laou's The Old Sorceress and the Valet is not a particularly obscure film: Enough people have seen it for it to have a page on Letterboxd, though not on Wikipedia. But it deserves to be better-known, if only for the performances of Jenny Alpha and Robert Liensol, who play the title couple, an elderly husband and wife reflecting on their life together. We first see Armand at the breakfast table waiting for his wife, Eugénie, to join him. When she rises from the bed, she calls out for him to bring her robe, but he doesn't respond, even when she joins him, grumbling and scolding. And then he disappears from the apartment and we see Eugénie in her nightgown at a window, calling out for him, a moment that recurs throughout the movie. We then concentrate on Eugénie herself, as she deals with a variety of clients who have come to her for her aid as a sorceress: One woman wants help in murdering her husband, a man wants another man to fall in love with him, and so on. In addition to potions, Eugénie offers advice, much of it sensible. Then the major thread of the film begins: Eugénie and Armand take a walk through Paris, reflecting -- usually bitterly and angrily, but sometimes with tenderness -- on their life together. As the film proceeds, we notice some discontinuities: Eugénie, for example, sometimes walks with a cane or carries a purse, but not always. We see them trapped on a traffic island as they try to cross a busy thoroughfare, and then we see Eugénie alone, being rescued from the island by two policemen. We gather that there has been discord throughout their life in Paris ever since they came there, many decades ago, from Martinique. Alpha, the actress who plays her, was a celebrated performer in nightclubs and on stage, and Eugénie was a showgirl until age reduced her to her current job, dealing with a mostly white clientele. Armand was a valet to a man they refer to as "Master," with whom Eugénie had an affair. The film builds to a revelation that probably doesn't surprise many who see it, and in fact feels a little clumsily handled. But what matters are the haunting insights into the lives of the characters, superbly embodied by their performers.