Louis Malle’s Typical Vibe
Signature vibe

Highest-ranked title
Highest-ranked title
Louis Malle has 14 titles in the CriticCrunch catalog across a career spanning the 1950s through the 1990s. 1 ranks in the Top 10%, led by Elevator to the Gallows.
Recurring themes

A self-assured businessman murders his employer, husband of his mistress, which unintentionally provokes an ill-fated chain of events.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Jeanne Moreau, Maurice Ronet, Georges Poujouly

Au revoir les enfants tells a heartbreaking story of friendship and devastating loss concerning two boys living in Nazi-occupied France. At a provincial Catholic boarding school, the precocious youths enjoy true camaraderie—until a secret is revealed. Based on events from writer-director Malle’s own childhood, the film is a subtle, precisely observed tale of courage, cowardice, and tragic awakening.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Gaspard Manesse, Raphael Fejtö, Francine Racette

Two old friends meet for dinner; as one tells anecdotes detailing his experiences, the other notices their differing worldviews.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Andre Gregory, Wallace Shawn, Jean Lenauer

Depressed Alain Leroy leaves the clinic where he was detoxified. He meets friends, acquaintances and women, trying to find a reason to continue living.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Maurice Ronet, Léna Skerla, Yvonne Clech

Anthology film from three European directors based on stories by Edgar Allan Poe: a cruel countess haunted by a ghostly horse, a sadistic young man haunted by his double, and an alcoholic actor haunted by the Devil.
Dir. Federico Fellini, Roger Vadim, Louis Malle · With Brigitte Bardot, Alain Delon, Jane Fonda

In 1917 New Orleans, a 12-year-old girl is raised in a brothel by her prostitute mother.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Brooke Shields, Keith Carradine, Susan Sarandon

This loosely plotted coming-of-age tale follows the life of 15-year-old Laurent Chevalier as he stumbles his way over the burgeoning swell of adolescence in 1950s France. After having his first sexual experience with a prostitute and dodging the lips of a priest, Chevalier contracts a case of scarlet fever. When the fever leaves him with a heart murmur, Chevalier is placed in a sanatorium, along with his over-attentive and adulterous mother.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Lea Massari, Benoît Ferreux, Marc Winocourt

In Louis Malle's lauded drama, Lucien Lacombe is a young man living in rural France during World War II who seeks to join the French Resistance. When he is rejected due to his youth, the resentful Lucien allies himself with the Nazis and joins the Gallic arm of their Gestapo. Lucien grows to enjoy the power that comes with his position, but his life is complicated when he falls for France Horn, a beautiful young Jewish woman.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Pierre Blaise, Aurore Clément, Holger Löwenadler

A brash and precocious ten-year-old comes to Paris for a whirlwind weekend with her rakish uncle.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Catherine Demongeot, Philippe Noiret, Hubert Deschamps

In a corrupt city, a small-time gangster and the estranged wife of a pot dealer find themselves thrown together in an escapade of love, money, drugs and danger.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Burt Lancaster, Susan Sarandon, Kate Reid
A shallow, provincial wife finds her relationship with her preoccupied husband strained by romantic notions, leading her further towards Paris and the country wilderness.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Jeanne Moreau, Alain Cuny, José Luis de Vilallonga
The life of a respected British politician at the height of his career crumbles when he becomes obsessed with his son's lover.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Jeremy Irons, Juliette Binoche, Miranda Richardson
1907 Central America: Maria II is the daughter of an Irish terrorist. After her father's death, she meets Maria I, a performer, and decides to stay with the circus, and on her debut as a singer, unintentionally invents the striptease and makes the circus famous. Their inadvertent encounter with a socialist revolutionary lands them leading a revolution against the dictator, the capitalists, and the Church.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Brigitte Bardot, Jeanne Moreau, Paulette Dubost
There is a global gender war between men and women. A teenage girl tries to escape this reality and arrives at a hidden place where a strange unicorn lives with a family: sister, brother, many children and an old, bedridden woman who stays in contact with the world through her radio.
Dir. Louis Malle · With Cathryn Harrison, Therese Giehse, Alexandra Stewart