L'immortale

The French film L'immortelle (1963) was written and directed by Alain Robbe-Grillet. It stars Françoise Brion as L, the Woman. Jacques Doniol-Valcroze portrays N, the Man.

Director Robbe-Grillet wrote the screenplay for Renais' Last Year in Marienbad. If you've seen that movie, you'll remember that it was very quiet and almost dream-like. L'Immortelle makes Last Year in Marienbad look like an action movie.

The plot has an interesting concept--a man and a woman from France meet in Istanbul. He falls in love with her, but we don't know if she falls in love with him.

They wander through Istanbul. At every touristic site, she tells him that none of it is real. The ancient mosque was just built a year earlier, the cemetery was created for tourists, etc.

Then they part, and the plot consists of him looking for her. Many people either don't or won't speak French. Others give him information, but it's always wrong.

Robbe-Grillet shows us many interesting--if ominous--characters, like the man with two savage Dobermans. There's a second and third woman, both of whom know something, but don't share it with the man.

The movie does have its positive aspects--seeing the sights of Istanbul, and watching Françoise Brion appear in glorious Nina Ricci outfits--on a beach, on a boat, at an elegant party. (Director Robbe-Grillet loves to photograph Brion. He particularly likes long, slow scenes where we see her face in closeup.)

If you are a fan of 1960's French cinema, especially.of the Nouveau Roman* style, this is the movie for you. Otherwise, I'd look for another movie by another director.

L'immortelle has a decent 7.2 IMDb rating. I agreed, and rated it 7.

*Truth in reviewing: I hadn't heard about the Nouveau Roman style. It turns out that Robbe-Grillet was an influential author as well as a director. Robbe-Grillet wrote the standard work about Nouveau Roman. It's defined as "a work of art that would be an individual version and vision of things, subordinating plot and character to the details of the world rather than enlisting the world in their service." Now I know.

First off, let me qualify my comment by saying that the print of this film I saw was of low quality and that makes it a bit hard to judge the visuals-I decided to give it the benefit of the doubt as they seem good from what I can tell.

L'Immortelle is about a French professor who takes a teaching post in Istanbul and finds himself in an alien society. As there are many tourists who travel to this area because of a fascination with the Byzantine era, the natives play up that aspect of their culture for everyone. Through the comments of the mysterious woman to that effect, the film calls the authenticity of the architecture and artwork into question again and again. While this may sound like it leads to a portrayal of the city that makes it seem fake, the opposite is actually true. The fake city that is shown off to tourists hides mysteries that are near impenetrable. The willingness of the natives to share the false culture is a perfect excuse for keeping the truth hidden.

The plot of the film focuses on the professor's encounters (and attempts at romance) with a mysterious woman. She constantly deceives him in a way that is similar to the deceptions of the city itself to outsiders. Paradoxically, she actually points out the faux culture that surrounds them while maintaining her own deceptions. Viewers who are looking for meaning here may see her mystery as a symbol for that of the city the film explores.

Eventually the woman disappears from our protagonist's life and despite all of his efforts to find out more about her he ultimately fails to learn anything definite. Like the viewer, he is left to ponder what (if anything) his experiences mean.

As a frame of reference, one might say that L'Immortelle is like a combination of L'Avventura and Last Year at Marienbad. Like the former film it includes an unsolvable mystery and like the latter it uses the language of cinema to call memory itself into question (late in L'Immortelle there are remembered versions of scenes from earlier in the film that are different from the originals). Still, L'Immortelle lacks the clarity and coherence of either of those films, making it a minor albeit unjustly ignored classic.

In Alain Robbe-Grillet's screenplay for 'Last year at Marienbad' the Woman is 'A' and the Man is 'X'. Here she is 'L' and he is 'N'. They are played by Francoise Brion and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze. He helped to found 'Cahiers du Cinema' and was evidently a highly respected member of the New Wavelet brigade but judged solely as an actor he is lamentably lacking. In fact the phrase 'charisma bypass' springs to mind. There is at least a chemistry between him and the enigmatic, erotic Brion which is hardly surprising as they were husband and wife!

This is Robbe-Grillet's directorial debut and is a cinematic continuation of Le Nouveau Roman which avoids linear narrative. This results in a film that is by turns fascinating and frustrating. He and his cinematographer Maurice Barry have certainly made the most of the exotic locations and the glorious architecture but that isn't quite enough to hold our attention for its hundred minute length. The images of 'L' in lingerie and the incredibly sexy Turkish dancer are sure to 'arouse ones interest' for want of a better term.

This film serves to remind us if indeed we need reminding, that in the hands of the Eternal Feminine the male of the species is so much putty. I am pleased to have seen this stylish and in some respects mesmerising film but am in no hurry to see it again, unless perhaps to revisit the Turkish dance!

Alain Robbe-Grillet was the writer of LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD, this is one of my favorite movies of all time. I must revisit it though, because there have been many years since i watched it. And Time changes everything.

Robbe- Grillet wrote this movie too. He is the director as well. I liked it but i can understand the reasons why many people won't. It's almost inaccessible. It's too mysterious to call it a mystery movie, i am joking obviously, i just want to emphasize that this is so weird and obscure that i couldn't be sure even if there is a mystery here or a riddle or the creator just plays with viewers' minds. Is there a mystery here to solve or the viewers should just dive in their subconscious, without thinking it too much?

Is Constantinopole a mythical city here, a place that exists only in dreams because in reality, there are all fake, as the female character keeps repeating? Is it just a scenery for our deepest feelings to rise on the surface? Or a "real" city in which bad things and criminal activities are taking place?

I liked this movie because it made me contemplate about many things. Françoise Brion is unbelieavably gorgeous. I loved its narrative and the way that certain scenes keep repeating but not exactly the same. It was like a circle, the end is the beginning is the end. Like a cinematic "Ouroboros". Like Nietzsche's Eternal Return.

I can't rate it higher because it is too cryptic and i am not even sure it is brilliant or the director just being enigmatic for the sake of enigmas. It's more likely this is a STYLE OVER SUBSTANCE movie. Still, if you find it interesting as it was desribed here, watch it.

While the print of this one was more pleasing than the other Robbe-Grillet titles I watched to commemorate his recent passing, the viewing itself was marred by a couple of instances of temporary freezing. The film, then, was perhaps the most pretentious and, well, tedious of the lot – given that there’s hardly any discernible plot!

Again, we’re thrown into a remote Arabian locale (complete with relentless – and, consequently, extremely irritating – religious chanting) with, at its centre, a glamorous yet vapid femme fatale in Francoise Brion – to whom the title is presumably referring. Frankly, I’m at pains to recall just what went on in the film – even if only a little over 36 hours have elapsed since then…which is never a good thing but, usually, this is a predicament I find myself in after having watched some mindless/low-brow action flick and not a respected art-house one! What’s certain is that, as a film about the search for a missing enigmatic girl, it’s far less compelling and satisfying than Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’AVVENTURA (1960)! Incidentally, the bewildered hero of THE IMMORTAL ONE is played by Jacques Doniol-Valcroze – who happens to be a film-maker in his own right, actually one of the lesser (and, therefore, least-known) exponents of the “Nouvelle Vague”.

Though I have to admit that – in the long run – I was disappointed by the mini-marathon dedicated to this influential novelist and highbrow film-maker, I’d still be interested in checking out the other efforts he directed (not to mention hope to catch these three again in better representations and, perhaps, a more amenable frame-of-mind). In any case, I still have Alain Resnais’ demanding but highly-acclaimed LAST YEAR IN MARIENBAD (1961) – which Robbe-Grillet wrote, and for which he even garnered an Oscar nomination – to re-acquaint myself with, and that is sure to be an infinitely more rewarding experience...