The definition of eye candy, from the actors to the sets. There’s one scene where Madame Émery tells Geneviève that she “looks terrible” and I laughed, because it’s Catherine Deneuve and I don’t buy it.
I think I confused this with The Young Girls of Rochefort and expected more choreographed musical numbers. There’s limits to the experimental sung-through, prosaic dialogue — you want the release of a big musical number with choreography, but then again that is probably the exact thing Demy sought to subvert. Though there are moments that drift into a more dreamlike mode, like when Guy and Geneviève float through the frame on his bike (later echoed by his departure on the train).
Really, really sad text but the results is a bit cold and remote — you feel for Guy and Geneviève, but it never really deepened into a feeling of deep tragedy.