Hösle offers a valuable contribution to Anglophone Rohmer scholarship, bringing his philosophical background to the thorny topic of religion and film. For readers interested in a Christian interpretation of Rohmer’s films, I can warmly recommend this book; Hösle’s over-arching thesis about the religious basis of Rohmer’s films is supported by concise readings of individual films in Rohmer’s oeuvre, all of which illustrate with sensitivity and insight the religious implications of Rohmer’s comic morality tales.

Jacob Leigh, Lecturer in the Department of Media Arts, Royal Holloway, University of London, UK

In this through and detailed account of Eric Rohmer’s three great film cycles, The Moral Tales, Comedies and Proverbs, and The Tales of the Four Seasons, Vittorio Hösle demonstrates how Rohmer undertook one of the great studies of modern erotic life in his cinematic depictions of love relations between men and women. Understanding Rohmer as both a Catholic filmmaker and as well versed in the Germanic philosophical tradition, Hösle shows us how his acutely realist films, always based in a recognizable time and place, nevertheless offer a view of the metaphysical, spiritual and transcendent possibilities that may lie behind our romantic and amorous entanglements. This engaging book encourages us to return to Rohmer’s films with a vivid understanding of both their suggestive religious and philosophical resonances and their sympathy with the complexities of the human condition.

Fiona Handyside, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies and French, University of Exeter, UK