Par-delà les nuages

SPOILER: This the the final feature film that Michelangelo Antonioni directed, with the help of Wim Wenders, and adapts from his short story collection "That Bowling Alley on the Tiber". Beyond the Clouds contain 4 short stories with familiar themes that we've come to be accustomed to from his earlier works, and sums up those themes in vignettes which are weaved together via Wenders' directed scenes involving John Malkovich's The Director character. However, most of the stories seemed to offer little or no depth that we're used to from an Antonioni movie, while Malkovich's narration of supposed depth rattled on with unclear diction that sounded a tad pretentious and out of place.

Nonetheless, all four stories seem to touch on chance encounters, and extremely quick romances that played out more like lust at first sight, perhaps due to the lack of time (since they're short stories anyway) to allow for a more layered approach to carefully define and craft the characters as we know from a typical Antonioni movie. And the obsessive approach here is for the characters to disrobe to showcase a lack of deeper connection sacrificed for the immediate satisfaction of the flesh. Maybe this is the point to want to bring across with an observation of the more modern relationship?

The first story, Story of a Love Affair That Never Existed, tells the romance between Silvano (Kim Rossi Stuart) and Carmen (Ines Sastre), who meet when one asks the other for directions to a hotel, and later meet at a cafe. It's as if Fate is playing games on them when they meet, but part and meet again much later, but like the games people play, it's almost like a L'Avventura or a La Notte with the lack of communication, and of the expectations from the man.

John Malkovich's director character takes central role in the next short, who exhibited some really lecherous looks toward a girl working at a shop, played by Sophie Marceau. She is deeply disturbed and made to feel uncomfortable, but somehow plucked up the courage to approach him, and in what I thought was to scare him off, tells him her background that she murdered her father by stabbing him 12 times. But in a flash these two are off toward bedroom gymnastics.

The next short, Don't Look for Me, is the longest of the lot, with Peter Weller playing a cheating husband who has to choose between his mistress (Chiara Caselli) or his wife, played by Fanny Ardant. Perhaps the more star studded of the lot, with Jean Reno also stepping in for a coda at the end of it, which sort of expands the little universe in which this short exists. But unfortunately Reno's involvement also got relegated to some stifle of laughter as it goes into the implausible domain with laser quick romantic tanglements. There was a key element adapted from L'Eclisse with a kiss between a couple through a glass panel too, while the introductory tale about the story of souls was quite interesting. If there's a negative theme here this short wants to play upon, it'll be the duplicity of man.

In between this short and the next was a small scene which reunited our couple from La Notte, Marcello Mastroianni and Jeanne Moreau, where the former was painting a landscape which was reminiscent of that in Red Desert. Finally, we have the final shot This Body of Dirt, with Vincent Perez as a young man going after a girl (Irene Jacob) whom he just met, and falling in love with her, only to realize that it is a love that is too late. It's a relatively talkie piece, just like the first story, with the characters engaging in conversation while walking the streets of the city they're in, which sort of brings to mind Richard Linklater's Before Sunrise.

While on the whole the movie may have succeeded as individual pieces, they never quite measure up as a combined effort given the "excuse" to link them up was a film director's exploration of possible stories and a look for inspiration for his next film.

The worst segment in this very uneven sketch film is the first, a silly tale of abandonment featuring pretty boy Kim Rossi Stuart and the Lancôme model Inés Sastre. It reeks of chic and product placement. The second episode, with a bored-looking Sophie Marceau is hardly better; we can't care if she stabbed her dad six, twelve or 528 times. Sophie does have a lovely body, however, and the boutique she works in is elegant.

The triangle story is next, with Peter Weller playing a bilingual rich man with a wife (Fanny Ardant, sensational) and a mistress (Chiara Caselli, OK). Fanny's big scene has her smashing a vase then chewing out her straying hubby. She manages to be drunk, angry and horny all at once: I have never seen her act with such power. Pity that the little sequel with Jean Reno meeting Fanny in the empty apartment isn't very effective.

The last segment with Irène Jacob, a pretty girl with a big secret, is a little gem, but it feels tacked-on, not really a part of the picture.

Even though the story is light, the movie flows so beautifully and its visual so tranquil and poetic that it could almost carry the whole movie.

The film consists of four interconnected stories, all about different aspect of attraction between man and/or woman and how it frequently is ethereal. Their true desire seems to be always something that they cannot hold onto, it will flow out like a handful of sand.

I thought the most intriguing story was the last one where the more unattainable the woman was, the more the man desires her. It parallels her deep love for god, who is infinitely out of reach, but never closer to her heart.

A very good movie. 7/10

This is a special film if you know the context. Antonioni, in his eighties, had been crippled by a stroke. Mute and half paralyzed, his friends -- who incidentally are the best the film world has -- arranged for him to 'direct' a last significant film. The idea is that he can conjure a story into being by just looking at it. So we have a film: about a director who conjures stories by simple observation. And the matter of the (four) stories is about how the visual imagination defines love.

The film emerges by giving us the tools to bring it into being through our own imagination. The result is pure movie-world: every person (except the director) is lovely in aspect or movement. Some of these women are ultralovely, and they exist in a dreamy misty world of sensual encounter. There is no nuance, no hint that anything exists but what we see; no desire is at work other than what we create.

I know of no other film that so successfully manipulates our own visual yearning to have us create the world we see. He understands something about not touching. No one understands Van Morrison visually like he does. Morrison's Celtic space music is predicated on precisely the same notion: the sensual touch that implies but doesn't physically touch.

Antonioni's redhead wife appears, appropriately as the shopkeeper and she also directs a lackluster 'making of' film that is on the DVD.

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 4: Worth watching.

Although I'm a big fan of his work, and specially his revolutionary masterpieces, I would say this film did not live up to my expectations regarding Antonioni's abilities. In one word, I found myself utterly bored. I could not bring myself to share any emotions with the characters (no matter how hard I tried) and finally gave up on watching it. Malkovich was poorly casted and instead of bringing warmth and real human emotions to the character, made it a drag and sometimes impossible to follow. There are no real links for this four short stories, and least of all Malkovich's ramblings and philosophical (attempts at best) remarks bordering on sunday sermons. If you want good quality film, better stick to the director's earlier works. Sorry!!!