Mélo

The "film" is admittedly theatrical and reflectively melodramatic, so there is very little of anything film-like in it, i.e., mainly the dominance of the text, as in a play. Due to the typically dramatic asymmetry of the text/conversations over realistically depicted events, the "film" suffers from a typically dramatic drawback, which is why we prefer films over dramas - in 99% of cases, unlike on the theatrical stage, people simply do not speak in long monologues, especially grammatically correct ones with an interesting or important point. Therefore, the audience's identification with the characters' lifespan is hindered, but we cannot blame Resnais for that, but rather the artistic genre. Otherwise, there are several themes for contemplation in this drama - for example, classical music, which is often seen as a window to the soul, to a better world, etc., while here, all situations in which the characters reproduced music were places of insincere motivations, and music was a means of covering up ulterior motives. It is also interesting to observe, within the dialogues of the characters, a kind of "transformation of quantity into quality," when contrary emotions suddenly erupt during what initially appears to be a friendly conversation. Subjectively, I have given the film four stars instead of three precisely because I agree with the idea regarding Resnais' cinematic insanity and that is why I was pleasantly surprised by the film, especially considering that the filmmaker's next film was I Want to Go Home, from which I am still recovering... (08/02/2015)