It was entered into the 22nd Berlin International Film Festival where Blanc won the Silver Bear for Best Director.

[1] Muriel (Annie Girardot) is a shy woman who bluffs and blusters around in order to hide her shyness and to protect her loneliness, even though she longs wistfully for a companion of some sort.

But Muriel finally gets a glimpse of romance when Gabriel (Philippe Noiret) walks into the seaside hotel she is vacationing in.

After being projected the film, distributors refused to release it despite the combined star power of its two leads, Annie Girardot and Philippe Noiret.

[2] As a first time director, Jean Pierre Blanc's performance was highlighted by the press who praised the elements of social satire of the film, as well as the duo Annie Girardot and Philippe Noiret which was later reunited several times throughout the 1970s in such successful comedies as "La Mandarine" (which was released two weeks after "The Old Maid"), "Dear Detective", or Jupiter's Thigh.