French film in the 1980s might have lacked the invention of the New Wave but gritty police thrillers and nostalgic costume-dramas such as Jean de Florette and Manon des Sources brought French cinema to a wider audience than ever before. This landmark study is not merely a history of French film in the 1980s, but offers a set of critical essays on the crisis of masculinity in contemporary French culture, and its interrelationship with nostalgia. After a brief overview both of the crisis in the French film industry during the 1980s, and of the socio-political crisis of masculinity in the wake of 1970s feminism, the book is divided into three sections: the retro-nostalgic film, the Polar, or police thriller, and the comic film. Films studied in detail include Diva, Subway, Coup de foudre, Vivement dimanche , La Vie est un long fleuve tranquille, and Tenue de soir e, while the volume covers actors from G rard Depardieu, Daniel Auteuil, and Yves Montand to Isabelle Adjani, Isabelle Huppert, and Emmanuelle B art.

Analyse van de "Nouvelle Vague", een stroming in de Franse film uit de jaren 1960-1970, gezien vanuit Amerikaans standpunt