The Cinematheque

Cancelled Screenings

“The discovery of a new universe … With this film, I understood the importance of Breillat. It’s a shock to find yourself facing a cinema giant.”

Luc Moullet, critic and filmmaker

Undeterred by the indefinite benching of her 1976 debut A Real Young Girl, Catherine Breillat forged ahead with this much more palatable, though no less carnally consumed, follow-up. Solange (Dominique Laffin) is the Breillatesque director of an ​“incredibly perverted film,” leading a lifestyle of no-strings sex and agonizing indecision about whom to commit her heart to. Jim, a bisexual actor, is her main squeeze—not counting husband Bruel, unperturbed by her sexual roundelays—but the amour fou she really craves is kindled by Bruno, a fellow director. Initiating a series of cheekily self-reflexive works about a female cineaste and her personal/​professional orbit—scenes of Solange trying to picture lock her sophomore feature are especially meta—Nocturnal Uproar was the public’s first look at the male-gaze upending, unabashedly guy-thirsting cinema of the notorious novelist. Breillat calls it a ​“secret remake” of Godard’s A Woman Is a Woman. The head-bopping music is by Serge Gainsbourg.

In French with English subtitles

Due to the inadequate condition of the 35mm print and the absence of alternative screening materials, we have decided to remove this film from our Catherine Breillat series. Screenings will be rescheduled when the digital restoration of Nocturnal Uproar, currently in the works, is available.