1959
Directed by Alain Resnais
This is a film I watched awhile ago after being thoroughly impressed by Resnais' Night and Fog. This time, Resnais does another World War II film, but I am afraid he might have peaked too early.
I knew after watching this movie that I was not a fan, but I had a little trouble figuring out why. I guess I had a problem with the script. The words people were saying just weren't believable. Perhaps it was the translation, but no one talks like that. I could put an example in this post, but you really have to experience the whole film to know what I mean. It is like reading out loud a book, rather than two people having a conversation.
And, of course, if I had a problem with the script, I would have a problem with the whole movie since it is basically just one long conversation between a man and a woman. If the dialogue had seemed natural and flowed, this could be a great movie. However, I just wasn't buying it.
This is a film that I will give another try. Unfortunately, it didn't impress me this time around.
RATING: **---
Interesting Facts:
First use of very short flashbacks to represent haunting memories.
Originally was going to be a documentary but Resnais decided to include fictional aspects so he wouldn't repeat himself.
That jump from documentary to fiction completely threw me. It was two very different movies welded together by a blind person. Those nuked out scenes made me physically sick and that numbed me for the rest of the movie.
ReplyDeleteYeah that was pretty jarring.
DeleteIt was OK, but might have worked a lot better if the two lead actors had shared any chemistry
ReplyDelete