This was a really unusual and very interesting film--especially since the way the movie ends took me by surprise. I won't reveal it, as it might spoil the impact.

However, there is a serious problem with the plot. Like some other Truffaut films (such as Confidentially Yours),the main theme of the movie MUST be sustained by the actors behaving, at least initially, in a very improbable manner. Let me explain. The leading man and his family live next to a house that is for rent. A man leases it and when the first couple meet the new neighbors, the leading man realizes the new neighbor's wife is his old lover. This all occurs by chance. Okay. This is REALLY improbable but what happens next REALLY strains credibility. Neither the leading man or his ex-lover tell their spouses the truth about their past and this leads to a lot of uncomfortable moments. Considering BOTH were unmarried when their affair occurred and they currently had stable and loving marriages, it just didn't make sense why they didn't bring it all out into the open and have a good laugh about it.

If you ignore this credibility gap, the rest of the movie is really good and takes a lot of surprising twists. It's worth a watch, but is far from Truffaut's best.

In Grenoble, Bernard Coudray (Gérard Depardieu) and his wife Arlette Coudray (Michèle Baumgartner) are happily married with their son Thomas. When the next door house is rented to the flight controller Philippe Bauchard (Henri Garcin) and his wife Mathilde Bauchard (Fanny Ardant),Arlette invites the couple for a dinner party but Bernard avoids Mathilde. When they meet each other in the supermarket, they recall their love affair that traumatically ended eight years ago. However their love rekindles and they meet each other in a hotel room. But once together again, they have a stormy affair that ends again with tragic consequences.

"La femme d'à côté", a.k.a. "The Woman Next Door", is a tragic and powerful romance by François Truffaut with the love story of a stormy couple reunited again after eight years by chance but that cannot be together. The performances are magnificent and the conclusion is predictable. The final quote of the narrator Madame Odile Jouve for their epitaph is perfect ("Neither with you, nor without you."). My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "A Mulher do Lado" ("The Woman Next Door")

Can passion really die when a stormy love affair is over? That seems to be the question behind this 1981 French film, directed by Francois Truffaut. Having seen it when it was released originally, we had the opportunity to watch it recently when it was shown on a cable channel. Although we remembered the premise of the movie, watching for the second time did not have the same impact of the first time.

The story is narrated from the point of view of an older woman, Madame Jouve, who had gone through the agonies of losing in love. Her ordeal ended in trying to commit suicide, the scars of which she is presently suffering from the injury she received on her leg that now slows her movements. Mme. Jouve tried to jump from an eighth floor of a building, almost killing herself.

The action takes place on a small town near Grenoble. Bernard Coudray, an engineer, is living in a sort of idyllic suburban house. There is a sign on the house next door which advertises it is for rent. Bernard lives in what appears a happy environment with his wife, Arlette, and their young son. Bernard is surprised when he watches a moving van unload furniture. The house was finally rented.

What Bernard does not realize is that he knows the woman moving into the place. She is Mathilde, a woman with whom he was involved in a passionate affair that ended badly. Her arrival means that whatever inner peace he had, will be shattered as he tries to pick up where he and Mathilde left off. The fact they were involved is never known by their present spouses. Mathilde is married to a flight controller, Philippe.

As Arlette makes friends with her new neighbors, but one look between Bernard and Mathilde sets the stage for the passion that consumes them. The next thing is finding a place where to consummate what they feel about one another. It is impossible to hide what they feel for one another, something that is too obvious to hide. Mme. Jouve realizes what is going on right away, but Arlette and Philippe are totally blind about the affair.

As all things of this nature, the lovers are doomed. Both lovers are now married to others; there is not much for them to do if they do not want to hurt their current spouses. A desperate Mathilde has a lot more to lose. Arlette is more forgiving about her husband's deceit. Philippe decides to make a clean break from the house that brought so much unhappiness, but it is too late. Mathilde has another thing in mind that will seal her destiny with Bernard.

"The Woman Next Door" by Francois Truffaut tells a passionate love story in which the director, clearly influenced by his idol Alfred Hitchcock, gives the audience a good love story with suspenseful undertones. Mr. Truffaut worked on the screenplay with his often collaborator, Suzanne Schiffman, and Jean Aurel, who had also worked with him. The idea of bringing two former lovers into such close environment is almost impossible to pull. In this case, the mere idea the cheated spouses did not have a hint what was going on in front of them, adds another layer to the narrative.

Fanny Ardant's Mathilde is one of her best appearances in the French cinema. One can see her lust for a man that could have been hers, but things got in her way. Now seeing him again, she wants him, no matter what. Gerard Depardieu's Bernard does not quite come as inspired as some of his other roles, but he makes a credible lover and one can see how his desire for her never died. Veronique Silver is splendid as Mme. Jouve. Michelle Baumgartner and Henri Garcin are seen as Arlette and Philippe.