LE DERNIER HOMME (1969)
aka The Last Man
Article 3982 by Dave Sindelar
Date: 7-17-2012
Directed by Charles L. Bitsch
Featuring Jean-Claude Bouillon, Sofia Torkeli, Corinne Brill
Country: France
What it is: End of the world drama

A man, his wife, and a female friend emerge from a cave exploring expedition to find that the rest of the world has died from a nuclear disaster. Complications arrive when the man begins to neglect his wife and fall in love with the other woman.

Here’s another that’s finally been retrieved from my “ones that got away” list. My copy is in French without English subtitles, so I’m sure that I missed some subtleties in the dialogue, but the basic premise is pretty clear, and the story isn’t particularly difficult to follow. A few of the critiques of the movie say that it isn’t particularly well acted, and, truth to tell, I often get the sense that the actors seem a little bored with it all; given the situation, everyone seems a little too blase. If there is something about this one that makes it special, then it’s hidden in the dialogue; on the surface, everything seems a little obvious and even a bit shallow. There’s a couple of arty touches here and there, but it mostly feels pretty straightforward.