The Reception of Jacques Demy's "Lola" at Cahiers du Cinema

Much like Breathless, Jacques Demy's first feature Lola was not reviewed in the Les Films section of Cahiers du Cinema. For the main - Sommaire - section of the March 1961 issue, François Weyergans contributed a seven page article Lola au pays des hommes which considered Demy and his film. Reviews in the Les Films section of Cahiers generally ran two or three pages. Weyergans wrote,

"There is still a lot to say, but also there is nothing left to say. Let's hope that a lot of hogwash does not dog this fragile work. That they do not reproach Jacques Demy for having dedicated his work to Ophuls: in that, he takes part in the modern movement which sees Stravinsky reinvent Pergolese, Picasso Velazquez, and even earlier Mozart "borrow" from Handel. Demy and Cocteau: I find in the diary of the making of Belle notes which suit Lola. "the characters do not live, but live a life retold; a mood which corresponds more to feelings than to facts." "Lola is a film as beautiful, as fictional, as true, as ephemeral, as graceful as the wings of a butterfly."

In the conseil des dix
4 stars -- Henri Agel (Etudes cinématographiques), Jean Domarchi (Cahiers de Cinema), Pierre Marcabru (Arts/Combat) 3 stars -- Michel Aubriant (Paris-Presse), Jean de Baroncelli (Le Monde), Morvan Lebesque (Arts), Jacques Rivette (Cahiers du Cinema), Eric Rohmer (Cahiers du Cinema)
2 stars -- Claude Mauriac (Le Figaro), Georges Sadoul (Les Lettres françaises)