LGM Film Club, Part 528: We Won’t Grow Old Together

Criterion has had a Maurice Pialat series. I had never seen any of his films, so I checked out 1972 film We Won’t Grow Old Together. It’s an autobiographical film based on his own terrible relationships. Specifically, it looks at a director who is about 40 and his off-and-on girlfriend, who is in her late 20s. Of course he’s already married. The idea here is to be unsparing when looking at himself. The problem is that the Pialat character is awful. Just a sexist toad, often screamy. sometimes violent, he’s just a complete asshole. I don’t need to like a character to watch a film, but given that the woman is something of a cipher (I mean, she’s abused), there’s not much to keep your interest and I kept asking myself why I was watching this. I never really answered that question.