At the time ,French cinema was updating the rural thriller ,a genre which had begun in the late thirties/forties with such works as "Goupi Mains Rouges" "l'Assassinat du Père Noël" or "la Ferme aux Loups".The early seventies began with Granier-Deferre's "La Horse " (Gabin) and continued with another Granier-Deferre (this one) as well as with "L'Affaire Dominici" (Gabin) and "Les GRanges Brulées" (Signoret and Delon teaming up again).
These movies from the seventies were more realistic ,more "precise in their depictions of rural life than those released earlier."La Veuve Couderc",like one of his precedent movies ("Le Chat" also feat Signoret) was first a novel by Georges Simenon.In France ,people were amazed to see Delon playing opposite Signoret ,but most of the actresses Delon played with in the seventies ,with the exception of Romy Schneider or Jeanne Moreau,were starlets.There was really a special chemistry between them which was not as effective in their later effort "les Granges Brûlées" .Both are well cast,Signoret as a strong middle -age peasant woman and Delon as the fugitive .
Granier-Deferre helped pave a way to a new "Cinema de Qualité" which made us forget the pretensions of the new wavelet.
