I couldn't agree more with the previous commenter from Germany in that we are so accustomed to dialogue and plot coming from Hollywood that when something this thoughtful and pure comes along, it just blows us away. I love the way Rohmer slowly guides the audience into the film, without a need for narration, only the sights and sounds of Brittany. When the first words of dialogue begin, it is so natural, but says so much about the characters. "I don't want to plan my life around money", Gaspard tells Margot, and you see him go through a process of writing his sea shantey, a really great little piece of music if you ask me. And to see a five minutes scene with Gaspard and Solene actually singing the song was just riveting. How does rohmer make something so banal on the surface so climactic? On paper, his stories and his characters don't really seem that interesting, but he adds something to them that make them resonate so deeply in me, and I am almost awestruck when it happens.
The great thing is that I can say that for almost all of Rohmer's films, especially those that make up the "Tales of the Four Seasons" I can't say I have a favorite because things like favorite or top films just go against the grain of what Rohmer is doing. I read somewhere that Rohmer has never made a masterpiece, in fact, he's never even attempted to. and yet, each character he's given us, Jeanne, Natascha and Igor from Spring, Gaspard and Margot from Summer, Isabelle, Magali, Gerard and Rosine from Autumn, and Felicie and Charles from Winter, are drawn so vividly that I sometimes forget that they are only characters and not people I call as personal friends.
In addition, I'd like to add that Amanda Langlet's characters seem to be the only "pure" characters in any of Rohmer's films, both as Pauline and Margot, She is beautiful, kind, intelligent, honest.....whereas his other characters, though likable and sympathetic, all have certain flaws.., some tell lies, some are neurotic, some judgemental, deceitful..self-indulgent, capricious.., so forth.
