When is a Lighthouse a Phallic symbol? I took dialogue from one part of Jean Gremillon’s Poul L’amour d’une femme/ The Love of a Woman (1953) and put it under the image of the moment Micheline Presle as Doctor Marie Prieur puts on some lipstick and goes save a life. She’s having to choose between the man she loves and her profession, or rather he’s making her choose. Is it a man’s job? Will she have to give it up. Will she ever again feel as when she’s with him if she does?Context is everything. This rhymes with a moment later in the film where André Lorenzi (Massimo Girotti), the man she loves, deliberately leaves a lighter in her room. Will she give up her profession and return it to him? Will he be more understanding and go get it. Or will she face her future without him?
