Les rendez-vous d'Anna

Amazingly shot, with the film always demonstrating a tremendous, disciplined use of image to convey mood and story. The film is full of long takes using striking symmetry; the camera is always finding frames within frames. For me, the story itself is interesting intellectually, but does lack emotional power; traveling to a film festival, a young femme filmmaker has a series of sadly empty encounters with people, leading to long, well-written monologues by the various lost souls. Sometimes too on the nose and speechy with its ideas, but always intelligent, physically beautiful film-making. For those with patience and an interest in image as well as story.

Was a time when topics like bisexuality, biological clocks, loneliness, female identity, or diversity in filmmaking were cutting-edge stuff. Clearly that was a long time ago, and when you ignore those worn-out taboos and take a really hard look at this movie it's just a really boring travelogue. Call it Lenny Bruce syndrome. I guess you had to be there to get it.

The film hinges on a single character, and I didn't find her remotely interesting. We don't know much about her other than she is lonely. We don't know about her politics, her art, her opinions on anything, her flaws, her appeal...there's nothing to the character. She's a bland ice queen that attracts a multitude of people without trying, a super competent character who doesn't face any struggle, a supposedly internationally famous artist who doesn't seem very good at communicating with other people or has anything insightful to say. Why should I care about this person?

Unfortunately this film suffers from the lingering influence of Antonioni and others from sixties art-house cinema where the camera lingers ten minutes on literally nothing, because evidently five minutes of nothing was insufficient to build the mood of ennui. The same exact mood that the other 150 minutes creates in the same way.

When a single woman, in her early 30's with plain features - starting with expressionless eyes and thin lips unadorned by cosmetics, attempts to deal with people in her professional career world of film-making, in her personal world of family, and with her few, select friends, her inability to ignite a spark of spontaneity in even the most casual social encounters foreordains a shallow, isolated existence from which there can be no respite.

At no time are we given a hint as to why this young woman has become traumatized and de-sensitized to the point where her inter-personal responsiveness is mechanical and roboticized, and to where she is so emotionally-blocked she cannot even return a wave from a man who befriended her on a train trip from Cologne to Brussels, just walking out of his life as though they had not spent several hours in mutual soul-searching for a meaning in life beyond mere existence and attending to business matters. And to where, when her brief visit with her mother at a train station, and overnight in a hotel room, ends with her mother pleading with her to say "I love you," she coldly obliges, but then, instead of the natural follow-up of a shared hug, she just turns around and walks out of her mother's life for another extended period of separation.

Even given Anna's embarrassing lack of social communications skills she does have some redeeming positive qualities, starting with two of the most important attributes anyone can have and outwardly convey - honesty and integrity. This is a real person with inner contentment and the confidence to let the world in and see her as she truly is, which is consistent from the inner soul to the outer countenance, with no cosmetics and no theatrical affectations - just as earthy and unassuming as a human being can possibly be. And while she never projects in dress, speech, or manner the contemporary, overt "sensuality" to which her generation of young women routinely aspires, she seems comfortable with her ample female physical endowments in her two sexual encounters with males she dallies with, one a "ships in the night" encounter with a German man, the other with her current lover who is based in Paris, and who becomes physically ill as a result of her ascerbic verbal rejoinders, at the expense of failing to consummate their fleeting and perhaps final romantic tryst.

Because the protagonist in this film appears completely detached from societal conventions and contemporary behavioral patterns, this film elicits a pallor of honesty and in-depth psychological reflection far beyond the superficial treatment accorded most cinematic leading ladies. It takes guts to produce such a mundane subject matter film without succumbing to the temptation to over-reach and titillate the mature audience this starkly depressing material is intended for.

Well worth viewing on a repeat basis, if simply because Sigmund Freud would have had a "field day" analyzing the eccentricities of such a complex and disturbed soul as this one.

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My first impression on The Meetings of Anna was that Lost in Translation directed by a gloomy Wes Anderson. This is my first Akerman, so I didn't know what to expect from this. The more I think about it it feels like this is the kind of film that grows on you as time passes. The loneliness of Anna all the while everyone she meets is opening up to her although she always seeming distant was quite relatable. There are so many choices that life offers you, but you are confused and miserable so that you reject all that and yearns for something you don't know yet or something you are denying. I saw it a couple of days ago but it has a deeper impression on me now since it has been in my head for these days.

Long, unmoving, precise and artistic shots; substantial quiet, and no music; dialogue ranging from unnaturally verbose and explanatory or direct to mundanely matter-of-fact and plainspoken; scene writing that joins the dialogue in being curiously dry and detached, at once personal and detached; performances as low-key as the overall tone is subdued: this is definitely a Chantal Akerman picture. Certainly she's not the only filmmaker to have employed such a style, and indeed at various points one recognizes tinges of comparable styles of other filmmakers. Yet as if her celebrated 'Jeanne Dielman' in 1975 hadn't cemented her panache for minimalist but masterful movie-making, and her penchant for hushed, idiosyncratically understated storytelling, this 1978 feature aptly accentuates these notions while trying a few slightly different ideas. For all this, I can understand how the title won't appeal to all comers, above all since on the surface there is very little happening over these two hours. Yet if one watches and listens attentively, as with Akerman's other works there are substantial, substantive depths that become more evident and more flavorful over time. 'Les rendez-vous d'Anna' is perhaps an acquired taste, but for those ready and willing to actively engage, it's a softly striking, rewarding viewing experience that's well worth exploring.

Akerman is a filmmaker whose tremendous skill and success lies in her absolute grasp of and proficiency in subtlety. All those outward qualities, that to the uninitiated or unprepared may come off as awkward or lacking, are part and parcel of a grand if decidedly underhanded vision. Thoughts broached in the dialogue - specifically as to personal relationships or musings on Europe in the aftermath of World War II - are obliquely echoed and amplified in the fundamental construction of the movie; for Akerman storytelling and film-making are emphatically one and the same, and that is proven again here just as surely as it was three years prior. Themes of loneliness, isolation, dispassionate malaise, and social and psychological struggles with communication, and a broad sense of undefinable hardship, are reflected in how characters are arranged in a scene, and where they face, especially as they talk to each other or touch; the camera may pointedly center only a single character for most if not all of a conversation, even when their scene partner is speaking. The themes are reflected in the transient nature of scenes, and the limited time that characters have on-screen with protagonist Anna; in passing sights of largely empty settings; in the almost completely static, stationary cinematography, that subsequently evokes a feeling of disconnected solitude. Even the relative noiselessness, and the restrained acting, lend to airs of separation, and being apart, and intangible distance. All this, to say nothing of the particulars of the writing in every regard.

And despite the overarching tenor, let there be no doubt that 'Les rendez-vous d'Anna' is superbly crafted, with capability, care, and passion belying all that the title portends. "Excellence" is the word of the day across the board when it comes to filming locations, production design and art direction, costume design, hair and makeup, and sound design. Muted as Jean Penzer's photography is, it's deftly calculated and smartly executed; Francine Sandberg's editing comes off as comparatively relaxed, yet is obviously characterized by no less intelligence. Even with the feature's tack being what it is, the abilities of the cast unquestionably shine through with admirable, controlled nuance and range, impressing all the more for consideration of that self-discipline. Naturally star Aurore Clément stands out most as protagonist Anna, but those in supporting parts are just as terrific, not least Lea Massari and Jean-Pierre Cassel.; what the actors are able to achieve under these conditions is kind of incredible. Above all, Akelman's gentle but meticulous direction and her wonderfully sharp writing are both frankly outstanding, a stupendous delight as a viewer both for how much significant thought was poured into them individually, and for the complexity with which they are interconnected. Not to again draw comparison, but as with 'Jeanne Dielman,' Akerman shows such a mind for shot composition and intricacy in conjuring and realizing scenes that it almost feels as though she had mapped out the entirety of the runtime down to the second.

Once more, I totally get how this won't sit well with all audiences. Akerman operates with such a majorly delicate hand in every capacity that one must most assuredly be receptive to such fare or else the entirety will come across as a whole lot of nothing. For those who are willing to put in a bit of work themselves to get the most out of movies, however, the profit to be had here is exceptional. 'Les rendez-vous d'Anna' is rich, absorbing, satisfying, rewarding - and maybe even a tad haunting in the ideas at play. Though best suggested for what is no doubt a relatively niche audience, as far as I'm concerned this earns a very high, hearty recommendation, and it's well worth seeking out if one has the chance. Well done!