Daddy Nostalgia is a deeply moving love story, in a French/English production, about an emotionally starved daughter and her dying father, played by the great Dirk Bogarde, a self-absorbed, remote ironist who never had time for her.
The sad irony of his life is that even on the verge of death he still can't make that connection until the end of their last night together, and then only tenuously. The film, directed by Bertrand Tavernier, who has accomplished a body of wonderful work, is wise, bittersweet and unsentimental, excepting the background music of "These Foolish Things," played and sung beautifully by Jimmy Rowles, the jazz master.
The superb Jane Birkin plays the daughter with heartbreaking sensitivity as she flirts continually with her father, as does he with her, then turns hard momentarily with the devastating, "I don't want to hear about your beautiful life. It was a selfish life and your selfish sun is setting." I wept. As the final credits rolled, over the sound track of "These Foolish Things," sung again with piercing beauty by Rowles and the surprising Birkin, I wept again. Who could ask for anything more?
The sad irony of his life is that even on the verge of death he still can't make that connection until the end of their last night together, and then only tenuously. The film, directed by Bertrand Tavernier, who has accomplished a body of wonderful work, is wise, bittersweet and unsentimental, excepting the background music of "These Foolish Things," played and sung beautifully by Jimmy Rowles, the jazz master.
The superb Jane Birkin plays the daughter with heartbreaking sensitivity as she flirts continually with her father, as does he with her, then turns hard momentarily with the devastating, "I don't want to hear about your beautiful life. It was a selfish life and your selfish sun is setting." I wept. As the final credits rolled, over the sound track of "These Foolish Things," sung again with piercing beauty by Rowles and the surprising Birkin, I wept again. Who could ask for anything more?