The Aviator's Wife

The Aviator's Wife (La Femme de l'aviateur, 1981) is a French romantic comedy-drama by Éric Rohmer, available to watch online on iFILM. A Paris student working night shifts at the post office spots his girlfriend leaving her flat with another man.

Stung, François decides to shadow his rival — the airline pilot of the title — and trails him across a summer Paris. Along the way a cheerful stranger named Lucie attaches herself to him, and the petty surveillance turns into a long, wandering talk about jealousy, fidelity and the affairs we invent in our own heads. Philippe Marlaud, Marie Rivière and Anne-Laure Meury take the leads.

This opens Rohmer's "Comedies and Proverbs" cycle, built as ever on conversation and close attention to young people muddling through love. Light, ironic and deceptively slight — almost nothing happens, and somehow everything does. Stream The Aviator's Wife online on iFILM.