Destiny is tragic. But I prefer one of our own making to one that is forced upon us.

One of Robert Bresson's most incandescent works, this early film also marks the teaming of two of France's most personal and idiosyncratic artists: Robert Bresson and Jean Cocteau. Cocteau, whose 1949 film Orpheus (Orphée) mesmerized post-World War II audiences in addition to his numerous other accomplishments, wrote the dialogue for Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne, loosely based on Denis Diderot's short story Jacques le Fataliste et Son Maître. Elina Labourdette plays Agnès, a young woman who has been forced into a life of prostitution in wartime Vichy, France, in order to support herself and her ailing mother (Lucienne Bogaert). At the same time, Hélène (the serpentine Maria Casarès) is breaking up with her longtime lover, Jean (Paul Bernard), and, feeling jilted by him, concocts an elaborate plot for revenge. Contacting Agnès and her mother, Hélène offers to take over their debts, move them out of the brothel they call home, and set them up in a sleek, modern apartment, with no strings attached. We discover too late Hélène's true motives; she is doing all of this so that Jean will “accidentally” meet Agnès, fall in love with her, marry her, and then become the subject of public ridicule because of Agnès' past.