Tries to be too much

I'm a big fan of French cinema, and also enjoy murder-mysteries and musicals. Combining them all with a cast that includes Catherine Deneuve, Fanny Ardent, and Isabelle Hupert seemed like a winning idea.

The film opens with Catherine Deneuve's character bringing her daughter home for the Christmas holidays. Not long after, we discover that the father is dead, and everyone in the house becomes a suspect.

As a murder mystery, this film is filled with satisfying twists and turns. Almost every ten minutes there is another startling revelation.

This film is set in the late fifties/early sixties, and the comedy musical aspect is very campy. The decor and costumes are all done as representative of this period and style, in a stylistic (rather than realistic) manner. The songs are fun, but I felt that the choreography could have gone further to build on the campy nature.

I had mixed feelings about this movie. On the one hand, it had many enjoyable aspects - and the fights between some of these actresses was certainly fun. But I also felt that by packing so much into the film, there was no time for real character development. There were a number of moments that could have been poignant and provided a nice balance to the film, if they could have slowed down the pace a bit and allowed the characters to develop beyond two dimensions.

This may be a film, however, that grows on me with repeated viewings.