Film Reviews by NW

Stunningly beautiful photography - the opening sequence alone, before anything happens, is breathtaking - even without Monica Vitti!

Antonioni and di Palma have clearly absorbed and extended the sort of lessons that Djiga Vertov offered in "Man with a Movie Camera", using industrial settings almost as living players, and they are able to add a masterly, spare, use of colour ... a rare enough gift in itself. They also have a story and, of course Monica Vitti.

There are few artists of any sort who can produce sheer beauty effortlessly from a blasted, poisoned industrial wasteland: That is what Antonion does: the condition of the wasteland is an echoing frame for the turmoil in Monica Vitti's head after her "accident" ... attempted suicide and breakdown. A pretty unappealing recipe for a film, one would think. Wrongly. This one is superb, and not only for the pictures.

I shall say nothing about the plot ... you can find all that in Wikipædia!

The film is flawed, of course - I felt that the plot was there for little more than two purposes: to support the pictures, showing just what Antonioni and di Palma could do with colour ... some of the pictures are clearly there for their own sakes alone ... and to provide a róle for a fine performance by Monica Vitti. What she undergoes may scarcely be a recommended course of treatment for nervous breakdown, but she gives it depth and variety, alive and amusing as well as distracted and sick. Her hair does not straggle all the time! As for the other players ... we get performances of sensitive exactitude - never a false note.

Seriously interesting thoughts about social and personal relations and political situations are presented ... but the story is ultimately subsidiary to the film in itself.

I was amused to find that while, as an english speaker, I often need sub-titles with American films; the italian dialogue in this film came over with beautiful clarity, even though I speak no Italian. You could almost learn the language from it.

There is a very good commentary - which I avoided seeing before writing this - by David Forgacs; he ventures further than I choose in interpreting symbolism and intentions, and gives very valuable background information. (No need to look for the symbolism – it sweeps over you!)

This film is spectacular, sharply and sparely filmed - as always with Melville - and meticulously detailed. Before watching it make sure that all your mental facilities for multiple plot line tracking are fully active and you are ready to distinguish between all the solidly built men in suits and trenchcoats! At the end of my first viewing of this tale of professionally planned robbery, treachery and death I was still quite confused about exactly how the plot worked ... Catherine Deneuve was as superb as ever, but I was still at a loss about her allegiances ... for example ... indeed, re-visiting after a few months I am still confused!

Beautifully filmed: as always, outdoes its american archetypes. The exactly detailed mechanism of the robbers' plot delightfully stretches things a bit far ... plots like that tend to hit snags in real life and Melville is being ambitious ... robbery on a train from a helicopter flying overhead - can you really believe it? The huge horseshoe magnet to unlock the train door? - but gosh, it is impressive. It may be daft, but if you are going to play the perfect robbery game, and you are Jean-Pierre Melville, go ahead: it will be a masterpiece! Similarly, Alain Delon's cold eyed perfectionism is rather beyond credibility, but why not? Remember to apply your sense of humour and the bizarre.

As always, I longed for french sub-titles – I found the really rapid dialogue hard to follow and the English sub-titles seemed often to vary quite a bit from what was actually said ...