One's first love is so intense.
A few weeks back, Criterion released a six-film set entitled "The Essential Jacques Demy," which naturally includes his first feature, 1961's Lola. Dedicated to Max Ophüls, it stars Anouk Aimée as the title character, a dancer who runs into a childhood friend who becomes infatuated with her, but she still pines for her first love, who also happens to be the father of her son. Meanwhile, she's also sleeping with an American sailor on leave, but that's strictly a business relationship.
As Roland, the childhood friend, Marc Michel is an incorrigible daydreamer, bouncing from one opportunity to the next, even getting involved with a middle-aged widow (Elina Labourdette) and her teenage daughter Cécile (Annie Duperoux), who reminds him of Lola when she was that age. (Significantly, she also had that name at the time since Lola is her stage name.) For her part, the young Cécile pals around with Frankie, the sailor (Alan Scott), much to her mother's alarm. Finally, Lola's first love, Michel (Jacques Harden), returns after seven years to whisk her away, which is bad luck for the heartsick Roland, but he'll just have to get over it. What other choice does he have, really?