1 fille & 4 types received favourable reviews from music critics, some of whom noted that it is a record many Dion fans were hoping would arrive one day.

Dion started working on her upcoming French-language album on 8 October 2002 in Paris when she met with four well-known French songwriters and producers: Jean-Jacques Goldman, Erick Benzi, Jacques Veneruso, and Gildas Arzel.

[2] Goldman, who had written and produced the best-selling French-language albums of all time, D'eux and S'il suffisait d'aimer, guided 1 fille & 4 types as artistic director.

[2][3][4] It was written by Veneruso, who had penned Dion's 2001 number-one hit, "Sous le vent", a duet with Garou.

[6] 1 fille & 4 types was also scheduled for release in the United States on 11 November 2003, in Japan on 17 December 2003, in Sweden on 9 February 2004, and in Spain on 19 April 2004.

[16] To promote the album, Dion taped a television special at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas on 1 October 2003.

[17] During the television special for Canada, titled 1 fille & 4 types à Las Vegas, Dion was interviewed by Julie Snyder, and short clips of performances form the Colosseum at Caesars Palace were shown, including "Le loup, la biche et le chevalier (une chanson douce)" (duet with Henri Salvador), "Je lui dirai", "Apprends-moi", "Mon homme", "Quand on n'a que l'amour" (duet with the winner of Star Académie), "Sous le vent" (duet with Garou), "Contre nature", "Toi et moi" (duet with Charles Aznavour), "Tout l'or des hommes", "Et je t'aime encore", "Ne bouge pas", and "Le vol d'un ange".

[19] The second television special, for France, titled Céline!, was hosted by Flavie Flament and included the full performance of the following songs: "Tout l'or des hommes" (with the "4 guys"), "On ne change pas", "Toi et moi" (with Charles Aznavour), "Et je t'aime encore", "Pour que tu m'aimes encore" (duet with Florent Pagny), "Le vol d'un ange", "Apprends-moi" (with the "4 guys"), "Le loup, la biche et le chevalier (une chanson douce)" (with Henri Salvador), "Sous le vent" (with Garou), "S'il suffisait d'aimer" (with Patrick Fiori, Florent Pagny, and Roch Voisine) and "Valse adieu" (with the "4 guys").

Rob Theakston from AllMusic wrote that 1 fille & 4 types "is a record that many Dion fans were hoping would arrive one day.

Her voice values dynamics over acrobatics and the band is stripped down to its bare essentials, taking Dion into relatively unfamiliar territories such as country-pop and folk, and she proves herself more than up to the task of delivering top-notch performances every time.

This stripped-down, back-to-basics attitude is only further reinforced within the album's packaging: Dion in several fashionably rugged poses that could have come straight from an Abercrombie & Fitch catalog complete with photos of a rugged life 'on the road,' including a shot of her with the band all lying on a bed together with her hair up in a towel and the air conditioner apparently not working during the summertime.

It's completely premeditated and no diva in her right mind would stand for such living conditions, but this only reinforces how far away Dion wants to distance herself from her image this time around.

[35] Entertainment Weekly editor David Browne wrote a mixed review: "The presentation cries out empress of overkill goes alt-rock, but the truth is much less engaging" and said that the album "does stand as a marked departure from her usual fare.

Forsaking orchestras and pop gloss, she and her guys offer up reverby twang in "Tout l'or des hommes," a slide-guitar romp in "Ne bouge pas," and enough mopey, semi-unplugged arrangements to make you think they just discovered Bruce Springsteen's "Tunnel of Love".

The album falls victim to the same bathetic love songs that cripple every Dion project, and the quasi-adventurous production gives way to drippy folk-pop balladry".