The Strange Ones

(1950)

★ 6.6 IMDb · 125 votes

Genres: Drama

Year: 1950

Runtime: 107 мин

Country: France

Director: Jean-Pierre Melville

Cast: Nicole Stéphane, Édouard Dermithe, Renée Cosima, Jacques Bernard, Jean Cocteau, Melvyn Martin, Maria Cyliakus, Jean-Marie Robain, Maurice Revel, Rachel Devirys

Plot

Elisabeth and her brother Paul live isolated from much of the world after Paul is injured in a snowball fight. As a coping mechanism, the two conjure up a hermetic dream of their own making. Their relationship, however, isn't exactly wholesome. Jealousy and a malevolent undercurrent intrude on their fantasy when Elisabeth invites the strange Agathe to stay with them -- and Paul is immediately attracted to her.

In a snowball fight between schoolboys the handsome Dargelos hits the chest of Paul, who drops unconscious to the ground. Paul has a deep affection for Dargelos, and later denies that there was a stone in the snowball that hit him. Back home Paul's sister Elisabeth takes care of him. The teenage siblings live together in one room, where they have developed several private games. Paul's schoolmate Gérard is secretly enamored of Elisabeth, and often stays with them. When Elisabeth introduces her new friend Agathe to Paul, he recognizes that she resembles Dargelos strongly, and immediately falls in love with her. Elisabeth marries a rich young American Jew, Michael, but he dies in a car accident the day after the wedding. Elisabeth inherits his big apartment with 18 rooms and a gallery, and the four friends move into it. Paul sleeps in the gallery, where he builds a replica of the siblings' old room. Both Paul and Agathe are secretly enamored of the other. When each of them reveals this to Elisabeth, she gets jealous, and starts developing a sinister plot to turn them away from each other.