La brune et moi

La Brune et moi (The Brunette and me) is a 50 minute film which explores French punk in 1979, showcasing a few bands that were dominating the scene at the time. I've been meaning to watch it since I discovered Edith Nylon and Taxi Girl over a decade ago, but apparently I'm so slow that I only recently learned that it has been available on YouTube all this time, and for a while via Henri - Cinémathèque française's free VOD platform.

Most of the music in this feature is actually pretty great, but it is unfortunately punctuated by a low-effort screenplay about a notorious (at the time) groupie called Anouschka who decides the time is ripe to be exploited by a businessman in return for a music career.

Bizarrely, the businessman in this puerile flick is played by none other than Pierre Clémenti. I heard his career had been derailed following conviction and imprisonment for drugs offences in the 1970s, but I had no idea the event was of such Granville-Paris Express proportions that the trajectory had taken him from Belle de jour to something as tawdry as this.

Nevertheless, La Brune et moi does offer an interesting look at how punk counterculture was playing out in Paris back then - something the media in the Anglosphere largely ignored - and for that alone, I think it's worth a watch. Well, actually... not for that alone. You need to see Pierre Clémenti in this. You really do.

If you like french new wave from 1980, don't miss La Brune Et Moi, there are a lot of these french groups more or less well known : Marquis de Sade, Edith Nylon, les Lou's, les Privés (excellent), Ici Paris (who are coming back since a few years with the wonderful daughter of the former singer Anicée Alvina with a great five titles record, have a look at their clips on youtube) and others.

The group I prefer are The Dogs from Rouen, dealing with American electric rock since 1973. The first part of their career was very electric and energetic and when they recorded with a new line-up in 1978,they got less electric, but we can still hear some furious titles like "Nineteen" or "Poisoned Town". And in that movie, we can see and hear "Algomania", a version much more furious than on the lp and brilliantly shot. Essential. Some unpublished furious electric Dogs titles from their early career could get released one day, but we're still waiting for the man : "unpublished Dogs? yes, there's sound" said one of their first manager. Come on now, action.