Color, 1980, 94 mins. 39 secs.
Directed by Just Jaeckin
Starring Anne Parrilaud, Zoé Chauveau, Charlotte Walior, Isabelle Mejias, Christophe Bourseiller, Philippe Klébert
Cult Epics (UHD & Blu-ray) (US R0 4K/HD) /
WS (1.85:1) (16:9), WVG (DVD) (Germany R0 PAL) / WS (1.78:1)
Thanks to the back-to-back 
global success of his two stylish erotic 
classics Emmanuelle and Story of O and the glossy all-star biopic Madame Claude, fashion photographer-turned-director Just Jaeckin was one of the hottest names in Europe for a few years in the mid-'70s. That didn't last long though as he expanded his horizons with a pair of excellent but widely ignored and misunderstood films starting with 1978's sublime The Last Romantic Lover. After helming one of the three stories in the erotic anthology Private Collections, he switched gears again in 1980 with his most obscure film by a long shot: Girls, a freewheeling depiction of female adolescence at the turn of the decade, made as a co-production between France, West Germany, and Canada. Though it still enjoyed some minor popularity in modern Germany (where it earned its only DVD release in the world in its somewhat different German cut), the film was a box office non-starter in France and sent Jaeckin back to safer sexy grounds with what would be his final two films, Lady Chatterly's Lover for Cannon and the delirious S&M adventure Gwendoline. Part of the problem with Girls was competition, with 1980 delivering three high-profile films based on a similar concept: Adrian Lyne's Foxes and the summer camp variant Little Darlings, both from Hollywood, and the massive French hit La Boum, a girl's-eye view of teen life that made an instant star out of Sophie Marceau and started a local demand for more teen-friendly dramedies. The formula would continue on and off throughout the '80s in Europe, with Roger Vadim belatedly jumping in with the equally overlooked Surprise Party,
When they're out on the streets of Paris, best friends and recent grads -- college worker Catherine (La Femme Nikita's Parillaud), de facto leader Annie (Chauveau), and factory employee Suzanne (Walior), along with Suzanne's little sister Betty (Julie Darling's Mejias)-- wrangle day jobs and get up to hijinks like swiping movie 
collateral with Paul Newman and Robert Redford or flattening the tires of an ex before the main titles are even over. They also spend time at a disco where much amusement is derived from Betty's virginity, something the girl is determined to lose-- triggering a twisty passage to adulthood for everyone with some unforeseen pitfalls to navigate.
Apart from a few shots of innocuous nudity (eyebrow-raising now for American audiences but mundane in France), Girls is a far cry from what Jaeckin's reputation might lead you to expect. A further plot synopsis would ruin some of the turns the film takes on its episodic path, including some darker material in the second half that makes this feel a bit like a gender-flipped version of the Lemon Popsicle films that had already gained major traction in Europe. The wild neon-soaked aesthetic from his TV show sequences in The Last Romantic Lover turns up again here in the club scenes, which are an utter early '80s blast with color clothes and a great soundtrack by 10cc's Eric Stewart (who almost died in a car crash before taking on the film). The entire cast is solid, but it's obvious why Parillaud became the biggest star (including a bid at mainstream horror with Innocent Blood) since she already knew how to command the camera without saying a word.
As mentioned above, seeing Girls at all was a major challenge unless you lived in Germany where it was released on VHS in the '80s followed by a 2012 flat letterboxed DVD from WVG, weirdly as part of its "Erotic Classics" line which must have resulted in some very confused viewers. 
That release reflected the German-language version of the film, which dubbed all of the leads and replaced German sex comedy actor Claus Obalski in all the scenes with Philippe Klébert to satisfy German financiers. In 2026, Cult Epics finally gave the film its due with a beautiful 4K UHD and Blu-ray edition featuring a robust, detailed, and very colorful restoration of the superior French version from the negative courtesy of 
TF1 (with HDR on the UHD making it a great piece of eye candy). The DTS-HD MA 2.0 French mono audio is also in great shape, with optional English subtitles. As usual there's a limited edition option directly from the label featuring a pink slipcase and two postcards.
Jeremy Richey returns to Jaeckin duties here with an informative and very thorough audio commentary covering the director's career at that point, the switch in composers for the soundtrack, the casting, and plenty more; he also delivers the visual essay "Who is Just Jaeckin?" (18m23s) surveying the filmmaker's relatively short but vital career, the high points of all of his films, the two overlooked films that meant the most to him, and the eventual reappraisal of his work. Also included is Jaeckin's final interview (16m54s) about his favorites among his films, some unrealized projects, and his artistic process. Next comes an interview with Mejias (20m48s) about representing the Canadian contingent in the casting, the zeal with which she went after the role, the weirdness of shooting some scenes twice in French and German, the strangeness of doing a love scene in a public park, and memories of working with Jaeckin. An archival spoiler-y French TV interview (4m39s) features Jaeckin, Parrilaud, Chaveau, and Walior briefly discussing the project and the nature of the characters, followed by a 25m59s reel of the alternate footage from the German version (not subtitled and pulled from the DVD, but nice for posterity). Also included are bonus trailers for Madame Claude, The Island Closest to Heaven, My Nights with Susan, Sandra, Olga & Julie, and The Key.
Reviewed on April 30, 2026
