L’Amour ouf: No, it’s not a musical… Clarifications!

Is there a musical comedy in L’Amour ouf? To put it bluntly, the answer is no! The film is very rich, with its long duration (over 2 hours) and has the peculiarity of mixing different genres that are not necessarily related in the same film, in this case, a really great love story and a gangster film. Sometimes violent scenes (the film is classified “All audiences are warned. Some violent scenes may be offensive to young viewers”).

Met during the promotion of the film, Gilles Lelouch immediately told us about the possible musical comedy: “never was. It is a romantic, musical and violent comedy, but not a musical. Yes, there is nuance in life!“- he adds with a smile.

A long scene about West Side Story that was cut from the final cut

So why does the idea that a movie is a musical persist in some minds? This comes from an interview given by the film crew on the last day of filming, when the film was in the early stages of editing (editing the film started at the same time as filming).

L’Amour ouf received only two media outlets during filming: the magazine “Premiere” and the team from France 2, for the movie show Beau Geste. On the microphone of this show, Gilles Lelouch indicated that the film would be “UA mix of genres, especially musical comedy. It is a teenage movie, a love movie…”. The show also makes some references to Scorsese, Tarantino and West Side Story…

At the premiere last December, Gilles Lelouch noted that “The film would be very musical“, which is right because it’s full of 80s and 90s music.

If the movie was never a musical, it should be noted that the cuts were made in the final cut. And this is exactly the scene for the musical that was cut, which recalls the cinema of Jacques Deme (with its colorimetry) or West Side Story. This was the original ending scene that was completely removed from the movie that is in theaters today. The first ending was a long dance scene, choreographed by (The) Horde. Adele Exarchopoulos and Francois Civil appeared there, as well as two young actors Mallory Vanek and Malik Fricka. We can bet that this deleted scene will be available on DVD/Blu-ray of the movie.

There is now only one dance scene in the film: it takes place in a high school light chase, following young Jack and Clothier to The Cure’s song, forest.

L’amour ouf is currently in theaters.