A Nos Amours (Criterion Collection)

With his raw style of filmmaking, Maurice Pialat has been called the John Cassavetes of French cinema, and the scorching nos amours is one of his greatest achievements. In a revelatory film debut, the dynamic, fresh-faced Sandrine Bonnaire plays Suzanne, a fifteen-year-old Parisian who embarks on a sexual rampage in an effort to separate herself from her overbearing, beloved father (played with astonishing magnetism by Pialat himself), ineffectual mother, and brutish brother. A tender character study that can erupt in startling violence, nos amours is one of the high-water marks of eighties French cinema.