Similar to Alain Resnais’ previous film Hiroshima mon amour, Last Year at Marienbad begins with a postulate of memory and perspective. A handsome stranger, X (Giorgio Albertazzi) encounters an alluring socialite, A (Delphine Seyrig) at a grand, baroque hotel and, captivated by her, attempts to convince the reluctant object of his desire that they have […]
From the opening sequence of a lovers’ embrace shot in extreme close-up, intercut with footage of atomic bomb survivors, Alain Resnais creates an asynchronous narrative rhythm in Hiroshima mon amour. A Parisian actress (Emmanuelle Riva) filming an antiwar public service announcement in Hiroshima, has a brief, passionate affair with a Japanese architect (Eiji Okada). A […]
There is a dual meaning behind the title of Alain Resnais’ eviscerating holocaust documentary, Night and Fog: a reference to the arrival of interned prisoners into concentration camps under the cloak of darkness, and the subconscious suppression of knowledge and culpability for the resulting horror of the committed atrocities. Arguably one of the finest documentaries […]
Filmed in 1968 at the height of the counterculture movement, as the escalation of the Cold War and a seemingly interminable Vietnam War pervaded the collective consciousness of the entire international community, Tony Richardson’s sumptuous, confrontational, and acutely rendered magnum opus, The Charge of the Light Brigade is a scathing indictment, not only of the […]
A silent film-inspired, quick edit, slapstick prologue punctuated by explicative intertitles and a sprightly harpsichord accompaniment sets the irreverent, whimsical tone for Tony Richardson’s freeverse adaptation of Henry Fielding’s beloved eighteenth century novel, Tom Jones, transforming the beloved comedy of manners satire as a giddy fusion of burlesque and Keystone Kops epic adventure. Unfolding as […]
The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner opens to the shot of an expressionless, lone runner named Colin Smith (Tom Courtenay) traversing a long, wooded trail as he explains in inner monologue the thoughts and abstractions that occupy a runner’s mind on these vast, empty stretches of road – during these quiet, uninterrupted moments of […]