…And God Created Woman (1956)

…And God Created Woman, released in 1956, was not Brigitte Bardot’s first film but it was the one that made her an international star, and a mega-star in France. It was Roger Vadim’s first film as a director.

Bardot and Vadim were married at the time. They divorced in 1957 but went on to make many more movies together, becoming one of the great director-star partnerships.

…And God Created Woman was a worldwide smash hit but like all of Vadim’s movies it has never been a favourite with critics. Vadim is perhaps the most consistently underrated of all French directors.

Juliette (Bardot) lives in a small seaside village. She was adopted from an orphanage by an ageing couple but now the wife wants to send her back. Juliette has been causing a scandal. In fact it’s not clear that her wickedness is much more than high-spiritedness but that is enough to have her branded as a hussy.

Wealthy middle-aged businessman Eric Carradine (Curd Jürgens) has become obsessed by Juliette. When we see her sunbathing naked in the opening scene we can understand why he’s obsessed.

Juliette is in love with Antoine (Christian Marquand), one of the three Tardieu brothers who own a failing boatyard. Her feelings for him start to cool one evening when she overhears him boasting to his friends that he is going to sleep with her before the night is out.

Another of the brothers, Michel (Jean-Louis Trintignant), is hopelessly infatuated with Juliette.

There are complications. Eric wants to buy the Tardieu boatyard in order to build a casino.

And Eric decides that the only way to save from Juliette from the orphanage is for her to marry. He would marry her, but he doesn’t want officialdom enquiring into his past. His idea is that Michel will front for him. Michel’s marriage with Juliette will be a façade. Carradine intends that Juliette will be sharing his bed, not Michel’s. That’s Eric’s plan anyway. It was one of those plans that seemed like a good idea at the time.

Of course it gets complicated. It’s significant that most of the trouble arises from people misunderstanding Juliette. They assume she’s a slut and they expect her to act like a slut, but she isn’t a slut. She’s a woman and her emotions are in turmoil and she finds herself with three men in love with her but she did not create that situation deliberately.

The characters we expect to turn out to be wicked are in fact not wicked at all. They’re in love, and love cannot be controlled.

This is not a film noir, it’s a romantic melodrama, and Juliette is not a femme fatale. She is dangerous to men not because she’s scheming or evil but simply because she’s gorgeous.

It’s obvious that the hostility towards Juliette in the village comes from middle-aged women jealous of her youth and beauty. The mother of the Tardieu brothers is the most villainous character in the movie.

Bardot of course is breathtakingly beautiful and her star power is overwhelming. She’s in sex kitten mode here but Bardot had the knack of playing likeable adorable sex kittens who were usually sympathetic characters. She gives a subtle finely judged performance here. The reason Vadim kept casting her in his movies after their divorce is that he recognised that she was a terrific actress.

This was also the movie that established Jean-Louis Trintignant as a star and he’s very good. Curd Jürgens was always good. But this is Bardot’s movie.

…And God Created Woman is in many ways a precursor to the Nouvelle Vague, the difference being that Vadim actually knew how to make movies.

Most of the online reviews start from the assumption that Vadim was a bad director because everybody says so and Bardot was a talentless bimbo who just happened to be cute. Vadim is an example of the unfortunate fact that once the critics get together to trash a director’s reputation online reviewers will just keep parroting the same nonsense. They consistently misunderstand this particular movie. The whole point of this movie is that Juliette is most definitely not a schemer, and Vadim clearly intends the audience to be completely on her side.

This is a great star vehicle for Bardot and it’s stylish and it’s a great grown-up love story. Highly recommended.

I’m a huge Vadim fan and I’ve reviewed a bunch of his movies including The Night Heaven Fell (1958) and Love on a Pillow (1962), both with Bardot, plus La Ronde (Circle of Love, 1964), Les liaisons dangereuses 1960 (1959) and Blood and Roses (1960). They’re all excellent.

Bullet for a Badman (1964)

There’s nothing better than approaching a movie with modest expectations and then finding that it’s a much better movie than one expected. Universal’s 1964 western Bullet for a Badman was such a film for me.

It is included in Kino Lorber’s Audie Murphy Collection volume 5 Blu-Ray boxed set.

It was directed by R.G. Springsteen, a prolific B-movie and television director. It is based on a novel by Marvin H. Albert. More about him later.

Even a lesser Audie Murphy western is worth seeing but this is a very good Audie Murphy western.

Initially it seems like it will be a routine golden age western. Logan Keliher (Audie Murphy) is a former Texas Rager turned farmer. He has a wife, Susan (Beverley Owen), and a son, Sammy.

Now Sam Ward (Darren McGavin) is back in town, to rob a bank and to kill Logan. Sam was Susan’s first husband and he’s Sammy’s real father. Susan divorced him when he was sent to prison and married Logan. Sam wants his wife and kid back and he wants Logan dead.

The bank robbery goes wrong, Sam’s whole gang is killed but he escapes with the money.

A posse is formed to hunt him down. Logan is hunting him as well. They do track him down and it’s at that point that this movie gets interesting.

The good guys have found Sam and they have found the money. And when money is involved there are no good guys. This movie was made at the tail end of the golden age of westerns and it’s just a tad more cynical than the westerns of the 50s. In 50s westerns characters were often corrupted by money but in the world of Bullet for a Badman almost everyone is corrupted. The members of the posse represent the law but now they plan to kill Sam out of hand and steal the money themselves.

There’s also Lottie (Ruta Lee). She was the girlfriend of Ira, one of the gang members killed in the robbery. She mourns Ira for about ten seconds then hooks up with Sam. She will cause a lot of complications.

Now it’s a case of the good guys who are now the bad guys going after Logan (a good guy) and Sam (a bad guy). There is moral ambiguity in golden age westerns but this movie does push it a bit further.

And it gets very dark.

The most interesting thing is the complicated relationship between Logan and Sam. They had been best friends. Logan and Susan thought they were justified in marrying since Sam was in prison and no longer capable of fulfilling his duties as husband and father but Sam does have some valid cause to feel aggrieved. And he does actually love Susan, and his son. He hates Logan, but mostly because he was a friend who (in Sam’s eyes) betrayed him. Logan will do whatever is necessary to defend his wife and child but he has no desire to kill Sam. Logan hasn’t forgotten their friendship.

All of this works because Audie Murphy and Darren McGavin are so good.

And Lottie is a nicely ambiguous female character.

Bullet for a Badman is a very fine western, still basically a golden age western but slightly more cynical. Highly recommended.

As for Marvin H. Albert, he wrote some great stuff including the brilliant action/adventure novels (written under the name Ian MacAlister), Valley of the Assassins and Driscoll’s Diamonds and fine hardboiled crime (as Nick Quarry) such as No Chance in Hell. And under his own name a very good spy thriller, The Gargoyle Conspiracy.

You should also check out the review of this movie at Riding the High Country.

I've reviewed lots of Audie Murphy westerns. No Name on the Bullet (1959) remains my favourite.