Is she a ghost? A memory? Hallucination? Or just French?
Robbe-Grillet’s solo directorial debut (after his sort-of co-credit on ‘Last Year at Marienbad’) is a pretty full-bodied dive back into similar waters when a French teacher, adrift in Istanbul without speaking Turkish, meets an incredibly attractive, though subtly odd, woman who refuses to say much about herself but is willing to show him all the ruins, graveyards, and mosques he can handle—seen via a fractured narrative, repeated scenes, and non sequiturs—all the while maneuvering him through a series of tableaus while avoiding seemingly mysterious men and dogs.
It’s fascinating, though not a lot ‘happens,’ and gorgeous to look at, though ‘what’ you are looking at is a bit up in the air.
Other than ‘Marienbad,’ this is my first Robbie-Grillet and I’m keen to see more.
Is she a ghost? A memory? Hallucination? Or just French?
Robbe-Grillet’s solo directorial debut (after his sort-of co-credit on ‘Last Year at Marienbad’) is a pretty full-bodied dive back into similar waters when a French teacher, adrift in Istanbul without speaking Turkish, meets an incredibly attractive, though subtly odd, woman who refuses to say much about herself but is willing to show him all the ruins, graveyards, and mosques he can handle—seen via a fractured narrative, repeated scenes, and non sequiturs—all the while maneuvering him through a series of tableaus while avoiding seemingly mysterious men and dogs.
It’s fascinating, though not a lot ‘happens,’ and gorgeous to look at, though ‘what’ you are looking at is a bit up in the air.
Other than ‘Marienbad,’ this is my first Robbie-Grillet and I’m keen to see more.
