Viewed from one angle, Alain Resnais functioned as a condensation of film production -- writing, directing, shooting, and editing his own films. But looked at from another angle, Resnais embodies a kind of schizophrenia, a multiplication of roles dispersing his voice...
[more]Viewed from one angle, Alain Resnais functioned as a condensation of film production -- writing, directing, shooting, and editing his own films. But looked at from another angle, Resnais embodies a kind of schizophrenia, a multiplication of roles dispersing his voice and being through time and space. It is the schizophrenia that we notice when viewing his peculiar and striking films.
Resnais' "Last Year at Marienbad," the result of a collaboration with writer Alain Robbe-Grillet, stands as one of the most formally complex and, in a sense, deranged films in cinematic history. It departs from the standard narrative technique by creating a story that may or may not exist solely in the mind of its protagonist. As its unreliable narrators multiply, the film asks us to question not only what will happen, but why it is happening in the first place -- or even if any of it is happening at all. "Marienbad" enacts a kind of filmic stream of consciousness, familiar narrative structure be damned. No longer will a tale unfold according to the logic of story, of cause and effect, no longer will film move seamlessly forwards, all things explained. Now we're not sure whether two characters talking on the screen are talking to each other; we're not sure where action is taking place, or why characters are in one place and not another.
With "Last Year at Marienbad," only his second feature film, Resnais shattered the illusion of filmic coherence, dispersing the order and logic we assumed was natural. The film commanded the grand prize at the 1961 Venice Film Festival.
Resnais was a precocious child, making his first amateur film at the age of 14. As the dust from WWII settled, he began filming documentaries and shorts, while working as cameraman or editor on other directors' projects. Having honed his skills, he delved into the life of Nazi concentration camps with "Night and Fog," thus beginning his preoccupation with the fragility of memory.
With an unmistakably formalist style, Resnais became one of the premier names to come out of the French New Wave. He went on to win the Cesar award at Cannes for "Providence" and has over twenty films to his credit.
[show less]
