Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		3.5
Overall		3.5

The Mother and the Whore 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov February 3, 2025

Jean Eustache's "The Mother and the Whore" (1973) arrives on 4K Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion. The supplemental features on the release include new program with actress Francoise Lebrun; new program with filmmaker Jean-Pierre Gorin and writer Rachel Kusher; restoration featurette; new trailer; and more. In French, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-Free.

When the Nouvelle Vague directors were gaining traction, their famous targets were the directors of the generation before them. Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, and Jacques Rivette frequently argued that their predecessors’ grasp of cinema was so deeply flawed that the entire process of conceiving, shooting, and evaluating films had to be reset. Then, when enough of their former colleagues -- various politically engaged critics whose opinions had some weight -- began agreeing with their radical criticism, they went even further, declaring that a reset was no longer enough. As a result, the ‘old’ way of making films was effectively discarded in favor of the ‘new’ freedom to do anything and everything with a film camera. While the euphoria lasted, the rebellious directors shot several wonderful films, like The 400 Blows, Breathless, and Pierrot le fou.

But in less than a decade the ‘new’ dissolved into randomness that quickly became tedious, and soon after it was impossible to deny that after eradicating the ‘old’ way of making films the rebellious directors had run out of creativity. To mask this development, some, like Godard, transformed their films into blunt political lectures, while others, like Truffaut, carefully pivoted to the ‘old’, reembracing a lot of what their earliest films could not tolerate.

Jean Eustache’s The Mother and the Whore is the grand and sad eulogy that made the death of the Nouvelle Vague official. It was released in 1973. However, the Nouvelle Vague had run its course several years earlier.

Like most of the films that the rebellious directors shot, The Mother and the Whore does not have a conventional narrative structure. It is a collection of episodes, each documenting the behavior of the young Parisian Alexandre (Jean-Pierre Leaud), who is involved in a ménage à trois with two young women. Marie (Bernadette Lafont) is the older of the two. She is also Alexandre’s roommate. Veronika (Françoise Lebrun) is the younger one. She is a lot like another girl (Isabelle Weingarten), whom Alexandre has been unable to keep. While Marie genuinely loves Alexandre, Veronika only finds him charming and attractive. For Alexandre, the opposite is true. He enjoys being around Marie and loves that she spends her money on him. He has unexpectedly fallen in love with Veronika and enjoys spending Marie's money on her.

The Mother and the Whore is a very long, dialog-driven film. Apparently, Eustache had scripted it, but it is very easy to tell that Leaud, Lafont, and Lebrun do a lot of improvising before the camera. Virtually all of this improvised material features chatter that Leaud initiates, controls, and terminates, and pretty much all of it is instantly forgettable. To be clear, it is not utterly meaningless, but it does not produce anything of substance that is in some way needed to grasp the nature of the arrangement between the lovers.

This rather fascinating display of nothingness is unquestionably what makes The Mother and the Whore a unique film. It transforms it into a killer that kills pseudo-intellectualism with an efficacy that one can easily argue has remained unmatched for two crucial reasons. First, it tricks the pseudo-intellectual mind into assuming it has something meaningful to share about the zeitgeist of the era in which it was conceived. The bait is Leaud’s socio-political chatter that touches on such current-again topics as the balance of power between the two sexes, the Revolution, the Palestinian cause, etc. Second, it is an improvised kabuki theater supplying ample evidence that the championed by the Nouvelle Vague ‘new’ is, contrary to its credo, devoid of originality, and, perhaps most importantly, substance. In other words, The Mother and the Whore proudly promotes the emperor’s beautiful new clothes.

*For a much more satisfying take on some of the same material, see Philippe Garrel's Regular Lovers.

The Mother and the Whore 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Criterion's release of The Mother and the Whore is a 4K Blu-ray/Blu-ray combo pack. The 4K Blu-ray is Region-Free. However, the Blu-ray is Region-A "locked".

Please note that some of the screencaptures included with this article are taken from the 4K Blu-ray and downscaled to 1080p. Therefore, they do not accurately reflect the quality of the 4K content on the 4K Blu-ray disc.

Screencaptures #1-29 are from the Blu-ray.
Screencaptures #33-39 are from the 4K Blu-ray.

The following text appears inside the leaflet provided with this release:

"This new 4K restoration was undertaken by Les Films de Losange and created from the 16mm positive reversal A/B rolls and a 35mm duplicate negative. The original monaural soundtrack was remastered from the 35mm soundtrack negative. This restoration was made possible by the support of the CNC and the participation of Cinematheque suisse and Chanel.

Mastering supervisors: Jacques Bosse, Boris Eustache.
Image restoration: L'Immagine Ritrovata, Eclair Classics.
Audio restoration: Leon Rousseau/L.E. Diapason."

I found the new 4K restoration quite underwhelming, but the lack of Dolby Vision or HDR grades was not a factor. On the contrary, I think that the decision to present the film without Dolby Vision and HDR grades was the right one. The main reason I was not impressed with the quality of the restored visuals has to do with the presence of some quite wild shifts in their dynamic range, some of which leave the impression that different areas of the film are heavily filtered. They are not filtered. However, these shifts produce a great deal of flattening that destabilizes blacks and introduces digital gray. This is a common flaw on restorations of black-and-white films completed at L'Immagine Ritrovata. A variation of the same flaw can be seen on the 4K restoration of Rocco and His Brothers. Here, the flattening can be a lot more pronounced because of source limitations. In select areas, I found these shifts rather distracting, plus it was very easy to tell that they eliminate existing detail. So, you should expect to see fluctuations that affect delineation, clarity, and depth, with the most significant ones appearing during footage with plenty of darker and shadow nuances. Grain can fluctuate a lot too, but this is to be expected given how the film was shot. Image stability is very good. I did not encounter any age-related anomalies to report.

The Mother and the Whore 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this release: French LPCM 1.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the main feature.

While bits of music can be heard in some areas, the film does not have a conventional soundtrack. It welcomes plenty of organic sounds and noises. The dialog is clear and easy to follow, but you should expect to notice unevenness, especially when the main character is on the streets of Paris or in busy cafes and restaurants. I did not notice any age-related anomalies to report. The English translation is excellent.

The Mother and the Whore 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

4K BLU-RAY DISC

• Bonus Features - there are no bonus features on the disc.

BLU-RAY DISC

• Jean-Pierre Gorin and Rachel Kushner - in this new program, filmmaker Jean-Pierre Gorin and writer Rachel Kusher discuss The Mother and the Whore and its cultural significance. The program was produced for Criterion in 2024. In English, not subtitled. (33 min).

• Francoise Lebrun - in this new program, one of the stars of The Mother and the Whore, Francoise Lebrun, discusses her background, how she connected with the writers from Cahiers du Cinema, and work with Jean Eustache. Lebrun also explains why she thinks that The Mother and the Whore redefines what cinema can be. The program was produced for Criterion in 2022. In French, with English subtitles. (15 min).

• "The Mother and the Whore": The Restoration - this program takes a closer look at the recent 4K restoration of The Mother and the Whore. It was produced in 2022. In French, with English subtitles. (33 min).

• Cannes 1973 - presented here is a segment from of the French television series Pour le cinema, filmed at the 1973 edition of the Cannes Film Festival. Director Jean Eustache, Bernadette Lafont, Jean-Pierre Leaud,and Francoise Lebrun discuss their collaboration on The Mother and the Whore. In French, with English subtitles. (11 min).

• Trailer - presented here is a trailer for the recent 4K restoration of The Mother and the Whore. In French, with English subtitles. (3 min).

• Leaflet - an illustrated leaflet featuring an essay by critic Lucy Sante and an introduction to the film by Jean Eustache, as well as technical credits.

The Mother and the Whore 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Even though the Nouvelle Vague had run its course a few years earlier, it officially died with Jean Eustache's The Mother and the Whore, an odd but very effective killer of pseudo-intellectualism that was not conceived to be one. Today, this film is worth seeing because it has preserved bits of the spirit of a world that no longer exists. It is quite long and not easy to endure, but it has been missing from the home video market for several decades, so it is good to have it available again to those that wish to give it a try.