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Marguerite Duras (1914–96) in a career encompassing literature, theatre, and cinema, made her first foray into filmmaking in the mid-1960s and between adaptations of her novels and works written expressly for cinema, she wrote and directed fourteen features and five short films. Duras’s cinema explores a profoundly different kind, breaking traditional forms and narrative conventions, with a poetic radicalism and great intimacy, extending the modernity of her written work, and reinventing the relationship between sound and image. Cinema ‘knows that it can never replace the written text’, she wrote in 1977; nevertheless, it ‘sets out to replace it’.
We are delighted and privileged to present four rarely seen films by Marguerite Duras, screening in beautiful restored versions at this year’s festival. We extend our gratitude and thanks to: Laboratoire Imagine; La Cinémathèque Française; Benoît Jacob Éditions; INA; Collectif Jeune Cinéma; Les Éditions René Chateau.
Notes by Marie-Pierre Richard.
LA MUSICA
Saturday 23rd (14.00)
Director: Marguerite Duras, Paul Seban
86 mins • France • 1966 • 4K Digital • Black & White • Subtitled
Moving behind the camera, Duras co-directed her first feature with Paul Seban, an adaptation of her 1965 play La Musica. Estranged couple (Robert Hossein and Delphine Seyrig) meet just after their divorce in the provincial town of Évreux, where they once lived. With the town almost a character in the film, the remarkable cinematography by Sacha Vierny, known for his work on Hiroshima mon amour and Last Year at Marienbad, expresses the intensity of emotions as memories and grievances, love and longing are recalled.
Tickets on sale here.
DESTROY, SHE SAID (DÉTRUIRE, DIT-ELLE)
Sunday 17th (12.00)
Director: Marguerite Duras
98 mins • France • 1969 • 4K Digital • Black & White • Subtitled
Duras’s début as a solo director is adapted for the cinema from her eponymous novel. Shot in atmospheric black and white, Destroy, She Said takes place in an isolated hotel on the periphery of a forest, where a young woman Elisabeth Alione (Catherine Sellers), silent and solitary, intrigues two guests: professor Max Thor (Henri Garcin) and an enigmatic writer Stein (Michael Lonsdale). While the place initially conveys a sense of peace, Duras gradually and skilfully ratchets up the anxiety and claustrophobia…
The screening will be introduced by Dr. Douglas Smith, School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, UCD.
INDIA SONG
Monday 18th (18.00)
120 mins • France • 1974 • 4K Digital • Subtitled
Considered one of Duras’s best, and based on a play Le Vice-Consul, it draws on her childhood experiences in French-occupied Indochina. Set in Calcutta in the 1930s, Delphine Seyrig plays Anne-Marie Stretter, whose ambassador husband turns a blind eye to her many affairs. An unexpected guest arrives at a party held at the French Embassy… To a haunting soundtrack by Carlos d’Alessio and the distant voices of the many characters who punctuate the narrative, Seyrig brings complex sensitivity to a despairing woman who has become an object of desire.
The screening will be introduced by Marie-Pierre Richard, Programme Curator, IFI French Film Festival.
AGATHA AND THE LIMITLESS READINGS (AGATHA ET LES LECTURES ILLIMITÉES)
Sunday 24th (14.10)
90 mins • France • 1981 • 4K Digital • Subtitled
An adult sister and brother, played by Bulle Ogier and Yann Andréa (Duras’s partner at the time), united by a forbidden love, meet in a vacant seaside villa bathed in a cold winter light. Overlooking the deserted beach and incessant sea, they become lost in memories. Duras adapts her own play, Agatha, from that same year, and voices the woman, and Andréa the man, with their voiceovers the only dialogue, while our two silent characters do not meet until the film’s conclusion. Image and sound are entirely dislocated.
The screening will be introduced by Prof. Laura Rascaroli, Department of Film and Screen Media, University College Cork.
A DIFFERENT MAN 15.40, 20.30
ARCHIVE AT LUNCHTIME: THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING DUBLIN (PROGRAMME 1) 12.50
IFI & DUBLIN FESTIVAL OF HISTORY – WOMEN & AMATEUR FILM IN FOCUS 18.30
JOKER: FOLIE À DEUX 13:50, 17:00, 20:10
KNEECAP 18.10
MRS ROBINSON 16.00
THE OUTRUN 13.30, 18.00
THE SUBSTANCE 20.20
YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN 50TH ANNIVERSARY 13.20
The IFI is supported by The Arts Council
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