Often regarded as something of a marginal wild man, director Philippe Garrel has been making intense, uncompromising cinema since the early ’60s. His latest film, and probably his most high-profile venture to date, is essentially a three-hander, a minimal echo chamber of a film in which the relationships of a woman and two men set up disturbing emotional and historical resonances. Catherine Deneuve plays Helene, a married woman having an affair with a younger man, Paul (Xaxier Beauvois). Paul takes to the road as acolyte to Serge (Daniel Duval), a grizzled and troubled survivor of the 1968 generation. Starkly shot in wide-screen by Caroline Champetier, and taking in a disorientating range of locations, Garrel’s film suggestively raises questions about art, desire, disillusion and self-destruction but all in a dream-like space in which nothing remains stable. John Cale’s spare soundtrack adds to the feel of chilly mystery.

France, 1999.
English subtitles.
Colour.
Scope.
Dolby stereo SR.
95 min.