8 Women (French: 8 femmes) is a 2002 black comedy musical mystery film written and directed by François Ozon.

Based on the 1958 play by Robert Thomas, it features an ensemble cast of high-profile French actresses: Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert, Emmanuelle Béart, Fanny Ardant, Virginie Ledoyen, Danielle Darrieux, Ludivine Sagnier and Firmine Richard.

Ozon initially envisioned a remake of George Cukor's film The Women (1939), but eventually settled on Thomas's Huit femmes after legal obstacles prevented him from doing so.

Drawing inspiration from Cukor's screwball comedies of the late 1930s and the 1950s work of directors such as Douglas Sirk, Vincente Minnelli, and Alfred Hitchcock, 8 Women blends farce, melodrama, musical, and murder-mystery film while addressing murder, greed, adultery, and homosexuality.

Their conversation drifts to the subject of the patriarch of the family, Marcel, and Catherine leads the first song of the film, "Papa t'es plus dans le coup" (transl.

The singing wakes up Suzon and Catherine's aunt Augustine, who initiates arguments with the rest of the family and the two servants (Madame Chanel and Louise), eventually returning upstairs and threatening to commit suicide.

The person turns out to be Marcel's sister Pierrette, a nightclub singer who is also rumored to be a prostitute, and who has not been allowed into the house before due to Gaby's dislike for her.

It is realized that she has been to the house before, as the dogs did not bark and she knew immediately which room belonged to her brother, making her the eighth potential killer.

When some members of the family react in outrage to the fact that she is a lesbian, Madame Chanel retreats to the kitchen, and sings "Pour ne pas vivre seul [fr]" (So as to Not Live Alone).

In the meantime, we find out that Mamy, Suzon and Catherine's "old and sick" grandmother, not only can walk but also possesses some valuable stock shares that could have saved Marcel from his bankruptcy.

"Heads or Tails", but referring to the ups and downs of life), to an entranced Augustine and removes the symbols of her servitude, her maid's cap and apron, asserting herself as an equal to the other women.

[5] Composer Krishna Levy also provided an instrumental score evocative of Bernard Herrmann, with touches of Miklós Rózsa and Elmer Bernstein,[6] as well as a soundtrack featuring eight songs performed unexpectedly by the film's title characters.

Its consensus states "Featuring some of the best French actresses working today, 8 Women is frothy, delirious, over-the-top fun.

[8] Jonathan Curiel of the San Francisco Chronicle remarked that 8 Women was "a movie that is so original, so funny, so alive with drama, intrigue, mystery and colors that you want to see it again and again", citing it the "new masterpiece" in Ozon's filmography.

"[10] Lisa Schwarzbaum from Entertainment Weekly felt that "what does matter is that a phalanx of France's most famous actresses play a gay peekaboo with their own images in the guise of replicating a '50s technicoloured production.

The result is weightless entertainment that's both camp and true, a warped adoration of star-quality actresses as amazing creatures who can project the lives of fictional characters as well as the essence of their own fabulous selves.

"[11] The Washington Post writer Ann Hornaday called the film "a gorgeous, if disjointed, spectacle, made endurable—if not entirely comprehensible—by its eye-popping cast."

She found that the picture "retains a stagy quality of heightened theatricality" and that "with its bold, luxurious palette and hard-candy surfaces, the film seems less photographed than forged out of silk and nail lacquer.

[13] A. O. Scott from The New York Times said, "The high-minded critical term of art for such a decadent delight is 'guilty pleasure,' but a movie like this reveals that stuffy phrase to be both a redundancy and an oxymoron.

"[14] Less enthusiastic with the film, Salon.com wrote that "despite the all-star cast of beautiful, talented actresses, this French whodunit never lives up to the grand musicals it rips off".