L'année dernière à Marienbad (1961)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

Alain Resnais

Writer:

Alain Robbe-Grillet (scenario and dialogue)

Release Date:

7 March 1962 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Plot:

In a huge, old-fashioned luxury hotel a stranger tries to persuade a married woman to run away with him...

Plot Keywords:

Hotel | Card Game | Monologue | Surrealism | Cult Director

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 2 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Delphine Seyrig	...	A / Woman
Giorgio Albertazzi	...	X / Stranger
Sacha Pitoëff	...	M / Escort / Husband
Françoise Bertin	...	Un personnage de l'hôtel
Luce Garcia-Ville
Héléna Kornel
Françoise Spira
Karin Toche-Mittler
Pierre Barbaud
Wilhelm von Deek
Jean Lanier
Gérard Lorin
Davide Montemuri
Gilles Quéant
Gabriel Werner

Also Known As:

L'anno scorso a Marienbad (Italy)
Last Year at Marienbad (USA)
Last Year in Marienbad (UK)
El año pasado en Marienbad (Argentina) (Spain) [es]
I fjol i Marienbad (Sweden) [sv]
Letztes Jahr in Marienbad (West Germany) [de]
O Último Ano em Marienbad (Portugal) [pt]
O Ano Passado em Marienbad (Brazil) [pt]
Perysi sto Marienbad (Greece) [el]
Viime vuonna Marienbadissa (Finland) [fi]

Runtime:

94 min

Country:

France | Italy

Language:

French

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Hong Kong:I | Italy:T | Argentina:16 | Finland:K-16 | UK:U

Filming Locations:

Amalienburg Hunting Lodge, Nymphenburg Palace, Munich, Bavaria, Germany

Company:

Cocinor

Trivia:

One of the films included in "The Fifty Worst Films of All Time (and how they got that way)" by Harry Medved and Randy Lowell.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: Exterior night scenes were shot day-for-night, but the sky and reflections of it were allowed in the frame, and they appear as bright white instead of black. This may have been intentional to emphasize the surreality of the film.

Quotes:

X: I must have you alive. Alive, as you have already been every evening, for weeks, for months.
A: I have never stayed so long anywhere.
X: Yes, I know. I don't care. For days and days. Why don't you still want to remember anything?
A: You're raving! I'm tired, leave me alone!

Movie Connections:

Spoofed in Le petit film noir (2004)

The Persistence of Memory

The title of Dali's best known work is an apt description of this film. A man meets a woman at a European spa and tries to convince her (and himself) that they met one year ago. While the plot is simple, its presentation is not. I first saw L'annee derniere a Marienbad while taking a French Film class in college. Of the dozen or so films we watched, Marienbad has stayed with me the longest. The nameless protagonist's memories repeat, sometimes minutely changed, sometimes not. The same organ motifs echo again and again, all against the backdrop of elegant hallways and sitting rooms. Through all this, the man attempts to spirit the woman away from her husband/companion, while at the same time establish once and for all what happened last year and what did not. More than any other film, Marienbad has shown me the difference between American film conventions and what else is possible. While so many American releases are rigidly plot driven, Marienbad uses film as a tool for exploration and introspection. Instead of linear story telling, director Resnais allows his characters to explore the details of what may be memory or just imagination. Against a detached, almost stoical background of extras and cool interiors, Delphin Seyrig and Giorgio Albertazzi display a sharp contrast of passion, pleading, and denial. I agree with a previous reviewer that much of the look of Marienbad has been appropriated by commercials for perfume; however, if you haven't seen this film before, you most likely have never seen anything quite so surreal.