Manon of the Spring Movie Review

In the sequel to Jean de Florette, we find the tables turned on Ugolin and Papet as young Manon (now played by the lovely Emmanuelle Béart) has grown up, though she's slightly deranged and lives in the hills as a vagabond shepherdess. (Of course, she's a vagabond shepherdess that is very attentive to shaving her body hair and studiously applying makeup.)

Manon carries with her the knowledge that Ugolin and Papet indirectly killed her father by sealing off his spring, so when she discovers the mountainous source of the spring -- and the water for the nearby town -- she returns the favor in kind. Alas, poor Ugolin finds himself falling in love with the wispy wanderer, leaving him dying both from thirst and a broken heart.

Gerard Depardieu, brilliant in Florette, is sorely missed in the sequel, but Auteuil and Montand as the guilt-stricken bad guys still make for lively and sympathetic villains to Béart's doe-eyed heroine. An admirable follow-up that completes the saga that Claude Berri started with such aplomb.

(Based on the second half of the novel Jean de Florette.)

Aka Manon des sources.