Alors que venait de sortir en salle Le Beau Serge de Claude Chabrol, souvent considéré comme le film ayant donné le coup d’envoi de la Nouvelle Vague, le chroniqueur cinéma du Monde évoquait dans l’édition du 18 février 1959 « l’ “instinct” cinématographique de la génération récemment arrivée en âge de s’exprimer ». Et de poursuivre : « il y a cinquante ans, un garçon qui avait ” quelque chose à dire ” composait un recueil de poèmes. Il y a vingt ans, il écrivait un roman. Aujourd’hui, il rêve de faire un film ».

Si le cinéma français est dans l’état dans lequel il se trouve aujourd’hui, c’est peut-être que cet « instinct » a disparu et que le cinéma n’est plus LE moyen d’expression pour ceux qui ont « quelque chose à dire ». Cinquante ans après, les nouveaux Truffaut, Godard, Rivette seront-ils des blogueurs ? Réponse en 2059.

Reader, K. (2008), ‘Another Deleuzian Resnais: L’Année dernère à Marienbad (1961) as conflict between sadism and masochism’, Studies in French Cinema, 8: 2, pp. 149-158, doid: 10.1386/sfc.8.2.149/1

A partir de L’image-temps. Cinéma 2 y Présentation de Sacher-Masoch: La Vénus à la fourrure de Deleuze, Keith Reader desarrolla un análisis comparatista entre sus teorías y la película L’Année dernère à Marienbad, dirigida por Alain Resnais y guionizada por Alain Robbe-Grillet. El artículo pretende demostrar que la rivalidad deleuziana entre sadismo y masoquismo es vigente, mise en image, en el film. La ambigüedad en la que se manejan las imágenes de Resnais hace acudir muchas veces al guión de Robbe-Grillet. El texto resulta más apropiado para aquellos que estén interesados en ampliar conocimientos sobre esta película o en las reelaboraciones del universo Sade/Masoch. No profundiza más allá de las palabras de Deleuze aunque si las enriquece con estudios de Zizek y Reik.

Parte de la separación deleuziana entre el sadismo y masoquismo. Aunque a veces son complementarios surgen de mundos separados, en los cuales las técnicas y los efectos son totalmente distintos. Es la tensión entre la tiranía de impartir control y crueldad –fijada, por una reminiscencia a Lacan, en la figura del Padre-, opuesta a la pasividad de solicitar servilmente control y crueldad –fijada en la figura del mundo matriarcal-. Este binomio presentaría una complicación frente al triangulo amoroso que aparece en la películ. Por un lado porque Deleuze presentados dos figuras y L’Année dernère à Marienbad un conflicto de deseo entre tres: A (chica), X (amante) y M (marido) y, por otro, el hecho de que no hay violencia explicita en el film, acto necesario para el tema que viene al caso.

Reader acude a Reik quien ya había implicado el masoquismo a actos fuera de las fantasías prefiguradas, es decir, actos que reproducidos. Desde su origen en Masoch, y su Venus im Pelz, el masoquismo va asociado a todo un mundo material, estático, frío, pétreo y sobretodo que prolonga el tiempo en un suspense, al que el sadismo no acude. El sádico refleja su fantasía en el mundo como un espejo. Deleuze en el binomio tiempo-imagen lo venía teorizando de este modo. Reader, sin hacer critica al respecto, acepta la literalidad del espejo deleuziano porque encaja a la perfección con el juego de espejos al que se juega en Marienbad. El palacio-hotel bávaro donde se rodó ha sido objeto de numerosos ensayos. El espacio se ha considerado, generalizadamente como verdadero protagonista del film en el que los espejos siempre le hacen volver hacia si mismo y las figuras humanas sólo están circunstancialmente.

 Sin embargo Reader da otra lectura al espacio. Esos espejos colocan al palacio y a M (marido y vinculado durante toda la película al hotel como si de un especialista se tratara) como sádicos. A y X hacen una alianza matriarcal contra M, una alianza masoquista. Estos dos personajes están implicados mediante sus diálogos y movimientos al universo de Masoch. A es una estatua, es pétrea, controlada en sus movimientos; X prolonga siempre un deseo, tiene una fijación fetiche por las estatuas y hasta se equipara a ellas. Ejemplificado en diversas situaciones durante el artículo, sí se hace evidente que A y X pertenecen a un universo masoquista. El caso de M quedaría relevado a una oposición que por estar enmarcada en el contexto de Deleuz (de tensión entre sadismo y masoquismo) queda forzada, muy probablemente debido a la brevedad del artículo.

La parcialidad del tema, de la que es consciente Reader, en relación a la pluralidad que ofrece el film, hace que el texto sea de una utilidad muy especifica. Es interesante como revisión de Deleuz y como otra lectura de L’Année dernère à Marienbad, pero no profundiza ni en su guión (del que sí pueden sacarse elementos eróticos y masoquistas que tanto utilizaba Alain Robbe Grillet en su corpus literario y fílmico), ni en la lectura de la imagen de Resnais. Por ejemplo, la fijación que tiene Reder sobre la elipsis de la violación podría ser desenmascarada mediante un análisis que penetrara en el lenguaje de la imagen, de su disposición, de su montaje. Pero este ensayo gusta más de un análisis de asociación filosófico que lejos de ser inadecuado peca de ser poco riguroso.

Sinopse:

Odile encontra com Arthur e Franz em uma aula de inglês e os conta que há uma grande quantia em dinheiro na casa de campo onde vive com sua tia. Arthur e Franz tentam convencê-la de roubar sua própria casa, enquanto tentam seduzi-la… No início Arthur tem mais sucesso, mas as coisas não são tão simples assim.

Ficha Técnica:

Direção: Jean-Luc Godard
Ano: 1964
País: França
Gênero: Drama, Policial
Duração: 97 min.
Título Original: Bande à Part
Título em inglês: Band of Outsiders

Elenco:

Anna Karina
Sami Frey
Claude Brasseur
Danièle Girard
Louisa Colpeyn

Trailer:

“Descontraído, estiloso e apaixonante. Bande à Part, junto com Os Incompreendidos de Truffaut e Acossado de Godard, é um dos expoentes máximos da Nouvelle Vague, um estilo peculiar do cinema francês. Cheio de inovações geniais, é um dos filmes mais interessantes que já tive a oportunidade de assistir.”

Download do arquivo torrent.
Download da legenda.

Link Alternativo: Filme em RMVB (Legendas Embutidas) – 315.3MB
Download.

Sinopse:

Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud) é o filho negligenciado de Gilberte Doinel (Claire Maurier), que parece ter tempo para tudo menos o bem-estar da criança. Julien Doinel (Albert Rémy) não é o pai biológico, mas cria o menino como se fosse seu filho. Gilberte está tendo um caso e não se surpreende quando, por acaso, Julien fica sabendo que Antoine não está indo à aula, pois ela sabia que na hora do colégio o filho a tinha visto com seu amante. A situação se agrava quando Antoine, para justificar sua ausência no colégio, “mata” a mãe. Quando seus pais aparecem na escola, a verdade é descoberta e Julien o esbofeteia na frente de seus colegas. Após isto ele foge de casa e arruma um lugar para dormir. Paralelamente seus pais culpam um ao outro pelo comportamento dele, após lerem a carta na qual ele se despede. No outro dia Antoine vai à escola normalmente. Lá sua mãe o encontra e se mostra preocupada por ele ter passado a noite em uma gráfica. Ela alegremente o aceita de volta, mas os problemas não acabam. Antoine se desentende com um professor, que o acusa de plagiar Balzac. Como ele odeia a escola, sai de casa de novo e para viver é obrigado a fazer pequenos roubos.

Ficha Técnica:

Título Original: Les Quatre Cents Coups
Gênero: Drama
Tempo de Duração: 99 min
Ano de Lançamento (França): 1959
Direção: François Truffaut

Elenco:

Jean-Pierre Léaud
Claire Maurier
Albert Rémy
Patrick Auffay

Trailer:

“Um dos expoentes máximos da Nouvelle Vague. Uma opra-prima que deve e merece ser apreciada por todos os cinéfilos. Um presente de Truffaut que será sempre um grande ponto na história do cinema.”

Download do arquivo torrent.
Download da legenda.

Link alternativo: Filme em RMVB com legendas embutidas:
Parte 1 | Parte 2 | Parte 3 | Parte 4

Ca tot am facut mai demult un alt articol despre coveruri, vin acum in forta cu altele mai misto, mai noi (sau nu) si nu neaparat mai bune decat originalul, dar cu siguranta niste variante interesante. Here you go:

He encendido la mecha de la Nouvelle Vague otra vez y ahora no podré parar hasta explotar. Pero no sufro, más bien al contrario. Con esa mezcla de improvisación y rabia contenida por parte de Léaud, sumada a las vivencias de una infancia inexistente de Truffaut nace uno de mis personajes favoritos, Antoine Doinel. Y si hay una película en la que el término “causalidad” (que tanto gusta a mucha gente) se pueda emplear, es Les quatre cents coups. Es la causalidad llevaba al extremo una vez tras otra, hasta que Antoine se convierte en un imán para este sistema sin premios y con cientos de castigos en el que da igual cómo se comporte, pues el resultado siempre va a ser el mismo. Está destinado a recibir golpes de la vida y es algo terriblemente triste, porque no hay oportunidad para la ‘redención’, por llamarlo de alguna forma. Truffaut ni siquiera le concede eso al final, en su llegada frente al mar, porque no deja de parecernos un espejismo de algo que seguro están a punto de quitarle.

Y fue muy turbia la sensación de ‘parecidos razonables’ que rondaba la película noruega Together, en el pasado festival de San Sebastián, reafirmada no sólo por la apariencia física del actor sino por ese plano casi final en un callejón con el póster de Les quatre cents coups detrás del muchacho perdido. La lástima es que cuando fui a hacer la pregunta al productor ya no había más tiempo.

Gossip:  it’s a bitch, but instinctive and innate.

Humans inherently love to talk.  And sometimes, they simply talk too much instead of allowing things to happen.  It’s often wiser to leave well enough alone, to respect a silence.  Our celebrity-obsessed culture teaches the very opposite, and coupled with the reality TV that swarms us, how can we choose to turn away from the whispers and remain decidedly ignorant of others’ affairs?

There are times when silence is violent, times when we should speak up.  The private relationship between two consenting law-abiding adults isn’t one of them.

Day Seventy-Three:  Our Lips Are Sealed – Nouvelle Vague

This is a cover of Billie Idol – “Dancing with myself” by Nouvelle Vague.

Nice to have time for yourself.

Lemmy Caution contra el mundo

De distopías va la cosa últimamente, o siempre. Me apetecía volver a retomar Alphaville, que para mí es una de las dos mejores películas de Godard, aunque de su primera etapa me encante prácticamente todo. Es una película bellísima por fuera y probablemente por dentro, con sus mensajes crípticos y su simbolismo deshumanizado en busca de los verdaderos sentimientos. Una ciudad futurista con claro aire parisino de la época es lo que hace a Godard dar rienda suelta a su desesperanzada visión del mundo y de la dirección que estaba tomando la sociedad, hasta llegar al control mental por parte de un ordenador, Alpha60, prohibiendo sentimientos bajo pena de muerte, creando seres programados antes que humanos y vetando palabras a cada momento. Y aún así, es Anna Karina en su papel de Natasha VonBraun quien lucha contra lo impuesto y no quiere dejar al espía Lemmy Caution; es la esperanza para todos, la inocente y hermosa hija de quien está al mando y necesita ser rescatado. En sí Alphaville es una película bastante curiosa, no sólo por la mezcla de géneros, sino por llevarlos a cabo con los parámetros de la Nouvelle Vague, que hacen de algunas escenas un festín demasiado bizarro (pero con encanto). Con una puesta en escena sencillamente magnífica, es una interesante visión al género de la ciencia-ficción al estilo Godard. Puede resultar compleja, de hecho, lo es o tiene la intención de serlo, como todo en manos de Godard, pero hay una increíble sensación de inmensidad. No entraré en el momento por el que pasaba el matrimonio Godard-Karina, pero parece un ‘regalo’ final muy bello para una mujer tan maravillosa. Y voy a obviar por completo la existencia de un remake.

This breakfast scene near the end of Baisers Volés(Stolen Kisses) is probably my favorite part of the film. Which is an amazing film anyway but here the colours are just so nice and soft, they go well together with the dialog and all the charm the characters bring. The full thing is on youtube with subtitles if anyone is interested but i could only find the ending without them.

I adore visually pleasing films, that’s why i like Sofia Coppola regardless of her abilities to tell a story. She sure makes them pretty. Anyways, back to the topic

oh and how i adore Jean Pierre Leaud..

The name of this blog is inspired by the Buzzcocks – in fact, the whole blog was inspired after seeing the Buzzcocks live.

Finally.

It had only taken 30 years but it was worth it.

I had a quick search for Buzzcocks references on WordPress and came across a couple of blogs:

• Nouvelle Vague – who did a lounge-inspired cover of Ever Fallen In Love
• Some plonker with his song of the day who thought the person who wrote Ever Fallen in Love was the one who sung it on the movie Shrek 2 – really!

A versão Nouvelle Vague também é ótima.

My ten favourite albums of 2004 exclude — and here I fully expect to be shouted at — the rather overrated Arcade Fire debut (it will not feature in 2005 either, seeing as that’s when it came out in many regions). But, Canadians take heart, Ron Sexsmith does feature. As always, this is not intended to represent the ten best albums of the year, only those I have and like best, with some not making the cut much to my regret (Patty Griffin, Anna Ternheim, Sufjan Stevens, A.C. Newman, Joseph Arthur, Kings Of Leon, Laura Veirs). Looking at some contemporary “best of 2004” lists, I feel hopelessly out of touch. Have some of these people ever been heard of again? Did they ever exist, or were their inclusion some kind of critics’ practical joke (Dungen!)?

* * *

Rilo Kiley – More Adventurous

What is it about Rilo Kiley that puts the critics in such ambivalent mood? More Adventurous lives up to its title: it’s an eclectic album, even if there is not much that’s particularly experimental. The variety seems to have puzzled the critics; I like it. There’s the alt.country, folk-rock stuff with which the group has been mostly associated (such as on the lovely title track and The Absence Of God), power indie-pop (the fantastic Portions For Foxes and It’s A Hit), a 1920s throwback (Ripchord), a torchsong country number (I Never), and what might be described as electronica country (the dyslexic Accidntel Deth). Apart from Portions For Foxes, the dramatic Does He Love You (discussed HERE) is the stand-out track. Throughout the lyrics are sharp, and on this album Jenny Lewis found her sexy, expressive voice.
Rilo Kiley – I Never.mp3
Rilo Kiley – It’s A Hit.mp3

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Brian Wilson – SMiLE

When I first got SMiLE , I did not get it. In fact, I was so disappointed by Brian Wilson’s long-awaited and much-hyped collaboration with Van Dyke Parkes that I didn’t expect to ever play it again, just to file it away in a spot where the handsome packaging, with the rather good booklet, would look nice. Then circumstances conspired, making me play the thing four times over on loop. The penny dropped and I got it. There are moments I can live without, yet these moments are a part of the trip: a post-psychedelic trip, a melancholy yet buoyant trip, a trip to a place that doesn’t exist anymore, and probably never did. It’s an album as removed from reality as Brian Wilson is said to be today. The timing of its release, in the middle of the corporate, synthetic ’00s was fortuitous. Coinciding with an era when commercial realism tends to trump enterprising creativity, SMiLE appeared as a connection to a time when innovation was not scorned but rewarded — ironically by putting together the one ’60s masterpiece that never was.

Mike Love apparently described SMiLE as an insult to the Beach Boys’ legacy. To prove his point, Mike Love in 2006 recorded that instant classic Santa’s Going To Kokomo, thereby mercifully redeeming the Beach Boys’ reputation.
Brian Wilson – Roll Plymouth Rock.mp3
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Mindy Smith – One More Moment

Mindy Smith’s name evokes the image of plastic blondes in skimpy beachwear living it up at the Playboy Mansion, not the reality of a writer and singer of beautiful country-folk music. Smith was in her early 30s before she finally released this, her debut album. Occasional visitor to this parish Stay-At-Home Indie-Pop (whose periodically updated blog is always very readable) last week commented about One Moment More that it packs an “emotional punch”, referring to Smith’s “supreme songwriting”. Indie-Pop, a man of discerning musical judgment, got it right. Add to that Mindy Smith’s superb, clear voice and ability to invest the right amount of emotion into her songs. Her version of Dolly Parton’s Jolene is probably the best of the many I’ve heard.
Mindy Smith – Fighting For It All.mp3

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Jens Lekman – When I Said I Wanted To Be Your Dog

Time was when Sweden burdened us with the regrettable likes of Roxette and Ace Of Base who were hauling in the glorious slipstream of ABBA. This decade, Sweden is a hotbed of wonderful Indie-pop created by artists who can create a catchy hook and an incisive lyric, even a cappela style. The Cardigans set the scene, but the godfather may well be Jens Lekman. Indeed, he gets namechecked, alongside Townes van Zandt, in what may be the best Swedish song of the genre, Hello Saferide’s The Quiz. Lekman turns out some rather good melodies, but the charm of his songs exist in the idiosyncratic lyrics. Take the upbeat You Are The Light: the protagonist gets arrested for defacing his girlfriend’s father’s Mercedes Benz at her prompting, and uses his one phone call to ask the local radio station to dedicate a song to her. There are startling surprises in many of his wry lyrics, but they aren’t contrived, and at times they are casually profound. That is an art in an age when so many people discern depth in Coldplay’s lyrics. And unlike Coldplay and their fellow worthies, Lekman is frequently very funny indeed.
Jens Lekman – The Cold Swedish Winter.mp3

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The Weepies – Happiness

Deb Talan and Steve Tannen were solo performers on the folk circuit when they met. They decided to collaborate, chose a stupid name for their duo, fell in love, married, moved to Topanga, California, and had a child, and in the interim have released three albums. It’s a happy story, with the title of their debut album an opportune portent. The harmonies are, as one would expect, lovely (especially on closing track Keep It There); none of the songs are likely to jolt the listener out of their comfort zone. But it’s not all predictable introspective coffeehouse folk stuff, and when it is (such as on the lovely Somebody Loved or Simple Life), it’s of superior quality. On other tracks, there are jangly guitars on the suitably upbeat title track, snowbells on the Christmas-flavoured All That I Want, bluegrass guitar on Vegas Baby. Perhaps the most affecting song is Tannen’s Dating A Porn Star, as good a country a song as one might find in this decade.
The Weepies – Dating A Porn Star.mp3

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Dave Alvin – Ashgrove

Dave Alvin is a flexible musician, at home in country, folk, blues, rock and punk. He has been a member of rockabilly band The Blasters (with his brother Phil) and the influential punk band The Flesheaters, and he wrote Dwight Yoakam’s country classic Long White Cadillac. Ashgrove is a departure from his previous albums, which covered either country and folk or bluesy roots rock (a genre title I despise). Personally, I prefer the country stuff. I’m not a great roots rock fan, but I do like it when Alvin does it — his guitar work is terrific. As always with Dave Alvin, the lyrics are worth following; some of them are compelling. Two stand out: Out Of Control tells a hell of a story, and The Man In The Bed Isn’t Me is truly touching. The sequencing is a bit jarring, though, with the bluesy rock alternating with the country songs, preventing the set from settling into a coherent mood.
Dave Alvin – Sinful Daughter.mp3

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Ron Sexsmith – Retriever

Every male singer-songwriter who enjoys any amount of critical esteem is likely to be compared to the tragic Elliot Smith, the genre’s eternal poet laureate (whose posthumously assembled collection of demos was released in 2004). Flattering though such comparisons are, often they are inappropriate and lazy. Ron Sexsmith’s sound has little in common with Smith’s, and his lyrics are more hopeful. Sexsmith also gets compared to Paul McCartney (and Happiness from Retriever sounds much like a Macca song), who has championed him. I suppose that the comparisons to Smith do not relate to sound or mood, but to songwriting chops. Retriever, like almost all of Sexsmith’s works, is a beautifully written. It’s a warm, gorgeous album, it embraces the listener in a comforting auditory blanket, aided by Sexsmith’s engaging voice and thoughtful lyrics. It’s not the kind of album, and Sexsmith not the kind of artist, that one turns to for a fix of challenging music; there is enough depth here to remove it from vacant pop, but it will not test the listener. It’s more of an old friend, instantly familiar and great company one is happy to seek out again.
Ron Sexsmith – Not About To Lose.mp3

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Nouvelle Vague – Nouvelle Vague

This is one of those unexpected albums: loungey covers of Punk and New Wave classics, such as Love Will Tear Us Apart (here set on a beach), Teenage Kicks, Making Plans For Nigel, Too Drunk To Fuck, and Guns Of Brixton (the latter two of which sound like Gainsbourg songs here). It’s all very sincere and quite fabulous, rendered mostly in a bossa new wave nova groove. Nouvelle Vague, a project by Frenchmen Marc Collin and Olivier Libaux using a roster of female vocalists, does not aim for camp comedy or winks and nods. The exercise requires that the listener simultaneously forgets the originals, the better to understand them on Nouvelle Vague’s terms, and to remember them, so as to appreciate their imaginative reinventions. Some don’t quite work (such as The Undertone’s Teenage Kicks), others compare very well to the original, especially The Cure’s A Forest, The Specials’ Friday Night Saturday Morning And PiL’s This Is Not A Love Song.
Nouvelle Vague – Friday Night Saturday Morning.mp3

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Missy Higgins – The Sound Of White

I can’t profess to be a great fan of the Australian accent, mate. And yet, it is always satisfying when non-American singers resist the temptation of adapting their accent for the international market. Melissa Higgins retains her strong Aussie enunciation, which can be grating but also helps to invest in her lyrics unblemished authenticity. Much of the lyrics are, or seem, intensely personal. Some of them are standard singer-songwriter fare, but there is much here that moves the listener, particularly the title track, about her sister’s death in an accident (featured HERE) and the child-murder song The River. The hit on the album was the upbeat Scar, which was rather unrepresentative of this pensive, though appealingly arranged album which has few weak tracks. If the disagreeable This Is How It Goes is the price one has to pay to have Ten Days or Nightminds, than that’s not a bad deal.
Missy Higgins – Nightminds.mp3

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Wilco – A Ghost Is Born

Thank goodness for the technology of digital playlists. With this album, I’ll never need to hear the pointless noisy distortions on the 12-minute long Less Than You Think again, even as I applaud Tweedy and pals for their willingness to do something different (though that something almost rivals Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music album for unlistenability). And, depending on my mood, I may skip the 10min-plus Spiders Kidsmoke as well, because the guitar solo really annoys me, by which I am doing the song an injustice. But the rest of the album is very enjoyable. It includes some of Tweedy’s best songs, such as The Late Greats and Hell Is Chrome. But the absolute highlight is — and Wilco fans will have guessed it — the opener, At Least That’s What You Said, which plods along with Tweedy in pensive mood until it explodes in gloriously angry guitars.
Wilco – At Least That’s What You Said.mp3

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More Albums of the Year

On this day in 1978, post-punk band Echo and the Bunnymen debuted as the opening act for the Teardrop Explodes at Eric’s Club in Liverpool.

While they were a popular in their native England, the Bunnymen had limited commercial success across the pond in the U.S.  Only 1984’s “The Killing Moon” and 1987’s “Lips Like Sugar” had any chart success.  However, they became more widely known to American audiences when “Bring on the Dancing Horses” was included on the soundtrack to the 1986 film, Pretty in Pink.

In 1985, the Bunnymen toured Scandinavia as a cover band, including songs by Television, the Rollign Stones, and the Talking Heads in their sets.  In 1987, they contributed a cover version of the Doors’ “People are Strange” to the soundtrack for the film, The Lost Boys.

Despite a lack of great commercial success, the Bunnymen have had a great influence on other musicians and, in 2002, they were awarded the Q Inspiration award by British music magazine Q.

Here’s French cover band, Nouvelle Vague, performing “Killing Moon” live in Athens in 2007.

And here’s The Quakes‘ psychobilly version.

Lo-fi band Pavement performed a version as part their 1997 BBC session, describing it as “an old family favorite.”

Finally, “Lips like Sugar” has also received its fair amount of attention as a cover song.

Some nice person on youtube put together versions by Coldplay and by the Smashing Pumpkins and threw in a bit of the Seal version from the 50 First Dates soundtrack at the end.

A propos de : Agnès VARDA, « Les plages d’Agnès », France 2008, durée 1h50 (dvd : Cinéart)

« Cette fois-ci pour parler de moi, j’ai pensé : si on m’ouvrait les jambes, on trouverait des paysages. Moi si on m’ouvrait on trouverait des plages. »

« Un peu de je, un peu de moi, et je déballe tout en vrac – et après je range un peu. »

Agnès Varda

C’est un film qui donne envie d’avoir vécu – non pas sans doute d’être déjà vieux, d’avoir avant l’heure autant d’années qu’Agnès Varda – mais un film qui, de cette maturité produit un tableau si généreux, si fécond, et à ce  point sans âge qu’il additionne tous ceux du passé pour ouvrir, loin de toute idée de dégradation, l’incommensurable espace mémoriel de l’imaginaire. Les plages sont là, de façon multiple et inventive, concrètes et métaphoriques, comme de larges étendues où se rejoignent des éléments de nature diverse, l’eau, le sable, la lumière et le vent, mais aussi béances dans lesquelles s’écoulent les pertes, les non-dits, les regrets, ou encore, mieux que des plages, des pages sur lesquelles la vie peut indéfiniment se rejouer, à tous les niveaux, se remettre à l’heure et se parodier, se contempler ou se ressentir. Sur cette plage plurielle, toujours recommencée, Agnès Varda  installe des miroirs :  ainsi se définit le cadre multidirectionnel de la rétrospective. Une installation ? Pas vraiment, on ne va pas rester en place, loin de là, Agnès Varda,  il faut la suivre,  son énergie est communicative ! On partira donc de Bruxelles, la ville natale, ensuite on descendra jusqu’à Sète sur un bateau plaine-de-jeux, après la guerre direction Paris, puis il y aura encore pèle-mêle de nombreux océans, des campagnes, l’Asie, les Amériques… La géographie n’est ni globale ni simplifiée : chaque ville, chaque lieu, chaque image se divisent encore en d’autres images qui elles-mêmes se divisent, s’associent, renvoient les unes aux autres – comment voulez-vous résumer cela ? Ça tombe bien : on l’aura compris, le résumé, Agnès Varda déteste. Réduire ? Ranger ? Oui, « un peu », à condition d’en faire quelque chose, de recréer, puisqu’il s’agit non pas de se souvenir mais de revivre – en mieux. Je crois qu’on peut revoir ces plages autant de fois qu’il faut pour en dénombrer les détails : à l’infini. Et je me garde de raconter l’une ou l’autre anecdote particulière, car il existe une structure propre à la mémoire affective qui fonctionne dans la fluidité, qui maintient ensemble des éléments étrangers entre eux ; cette cohérence est souple, lumineuse mais fragile : il faut la respecter. Par contre, la femme qui transparaît au travers de ce formidable périple scopique se révèle, finalement, très peu. C’est étrange parce que, face aux miroirs, avec tout ce que cela suppose de narcissisme et de coquetterie assumés (je me cache / je me montre, je fais des yeux de velours à la caméra, je mets beaucoup de jolies robes et des bijoux assortis, je me regarde et me dédouble dans ma jeunesse intacte), avec tout cela ses plages sont une arche, et sur cette arche le monde entier est invité, embrassé, aimé, car il ne s’agit pas de créer de la place en vrac pour fourrer tout le monde à l’intérieur, mais d’offrir à chacun un décors adapté à sa personne , une espace unique, une intimité. Ils sont nombreux, pourtant, les collaborateurs (dont une ex-collègue, Marjolaine Grandjean), la famille, les amis, les stars, les gens du quartier, les gens rencontrés par hasard, sans oublier les chats de la maison… En voyant cela, on s’extasie : c’est incroyable tout ce qu’on peut mettre dans une heure cinquante de cinéma ! Parce que je suis loin d’avoir fini mon énumération – et que pourrais-je écrire de mieux, pour rendre hommage à ce film, qu’une énumération de l’indénombrable ? L’événement politique n’en est pas absent, au même titre que l’événement privé, respectivement envisagés au travers de photos et de films, de peintures, de reconstitutions parfois comiques. Il convient de préciser que, avec sa voix égale, ronde et terrestre, avec son regard toujours mélancolique, Agnès Varda parle beaucoup mais elle se tait davantage – sur l’essentiel. Avec un tel parti-pris de pudeur et de retenue, il ne faut pas s’attendre à une mise en scène dramatique ou sensationnelle. A petits pas, à reculons, Agnès Varda circule sur ses plages, au centre et à la périphérie, comme le cœur et ses vaisseaux, paisiblement, figure pleine, entière, d’une femme qui ne se réduit pas à une seule personne, ni à un seul récit, mais qui, tant qu’elle sera en vie, continuera à se déployer, à étendre les cercles de la création, dans toutes les directions.

Les 80 balais d’Agnès Varda!

La maison de cinéma (en pellicule de film déroulée)

Les chats d’Agnès Varda (ses 2 dernières photos sont dédiées à mon ami Globe Glauber)

Tout ce qui concerne Agnès Varda, à la médiathèque.

… et l’univers de Jacques Demy.

Most of Christophe Honoré’s films leave me with a desire to be a young Parisian in the throes of love. “La belle personne“, the last installment of an informal trilogy which includes “Dans paris” and “Les chansons d’amour“, is no different.

What I love about Honoré is his ability to balance the past and the present–his gift to modernize and update traditions. It is quite obvious that he harbors an affinity with the nouvelle vague directors of the 60s, most especially early Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Trauffaut. You can see this in his films’ jangly rhythms, their preoccupations and their romantic intellectualism. However, his works are also unmistakably of their time, dealing with modern anxieties and issues.

I’ve always regarded Honoré’s choice of the dashing Louis Garrel as his screen alter-ego as ingenious. Garrel, like Honoré’s films, gives the impression of being contemporary while, at the same time,  coming from a well-pedigreed tradition. In “La belle personne“, he is in fine form, playing a lothario of a teacher caught in l’amour fou. His object of obsession: a laconic and mysterious student named Junie, played by Lea Seydoux (who, incidentally, uncannily resembles nouvelle vague poster-girl Anna Karina in some angles). Completing the film’s central amorous triangle is Otto, a student who also falls madly in love with Junie and portrayed with tender sensitivity by Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet.

Is this baby crying in German or French?  A new study says we may be able to tell. The study was originally discussed on my sister pod, The World’s science podcast. It   concludes that we begin language acquisition in the womb. At that stage, we are, well, a captive audience to mama’s words; researchers say we pick up a bit of her accent and intonation. Then after birth, we cry in ways that imitate that accent and intonation.

Then it’s off to Ukraine, where the Ukrainian language (see alphabet above) is enjoying a government-sponsored revival. This comes at the expense of Russian – with the notable and ever-delightful exception of swear words: people still curse almost exclusively in Russian. Why? you tell me, please…In any case, the government’s support of Ukrainians, especially in schools and colleges has turned this into an election issue. The two front runners in next January’s presidential vote are the pro-Western Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who generally favors the promotion of Ukrainian, and the more Kremlin-oriented Viktor Yanukovych, who believes Russian should be protected.  Which leaves our Kiev-based reporter, Brigid McCarthy, somewhat conflicted as to which language to study.

Finally, a conversation with the two French guys behind cover band Nouvelle Vague. Their new album re-imagines punk and new wave classics by The Sex Pistols, Plastic Bertrand and others. The singers tend to be non-native English speakers, female and young — young enough in some cases not to have heard the originals, or know about the ethos and vibe of punk. I like a lot of their reinterpretions because they’re so wildly different from the originals, yet add something that was seemingly overlooked by the original artists. It’s as if the musical code — the language — is flipped to reveal something previously hidden.  So, the vicious anger of the Sex Pistols’ version of God Save the Queen becomes a sweet, hymnal folk song. The Police’s poppy So Lonely becomes a desperate, haunting dirge. There’s a great linguistic flip too:  for the one song with lyrics in French, Plastic Betrand’s Ça Plane Pour Moi, the singer is an English woman who enunciates the French words with a marked English accent.

At the end of our interview, I offered the Nouvelle Vague guys my two cents on the punk classics they might next tackle:  anything from Elvis Costello’s My Aim is True album, Richard Hell’s Blank Generation,  Iggy Pop’s Dog Food, and top of the list:  a very early single from Adam and the Ant called Young Parisians. They should sing that one in French.

Listen in iTunes or here.

OK, I just need to include an image of the Pistols.