L’Atalante

Movie #10: Released in 1934, directed by Jean Vigo, 89 minutes. New to me!

LetterBoxd Score: 4.5 stars

I had never heard of this movie before. A tale of two lovers growing disillusioned with their life together on the river barge life in France; he’s riven with jealousy, she’s a bit bored, but also dealing with his jealousy. In a rash snap decision, one night he leaves with the boat while she has snuck off to see Paris alone.

…and because this is the 1930s and he lives on a river barge, they can’t reconnect for months! They search all over for each other, but how to find someone living a transient life? When they finally do reconnect, the agony of their time apart has renewed their love (though one wonders for how long). But it ends with their embrace, and I got misty-eyed.

The movie also has a variety of portraits of people who are living a little bit outside the norm; the first mate(?) La pere Jules who gets a scene or two to gesture towards a rich and widely traveled past as a sailor, and the peddler who tries to seduce Juliette. They suggest the possibility of living life broadly.

One weird vibe is this, like Sunrise: A Tale of Two Humans, centers its conflict around, in my view, a badly behaving dude who regrets his bad behavior and then gets forgiven. Have we made moral progress (perhaps only in the last 15 years), that this kind of plot isn’t as appealing as it once was? Or maybe not; maybe they still make the same kind of movies? In any event a lot of critics thought these plot elements were not serious enough to disqualify it from their personal list of the top ten greatest movies ever made.

It’s perfectly paced. Compared to any other movie on this list, it feels like a unified compact whole (under 90 minutes), and yet with that rare quality of short movies of feeling lived in and with room to stretch out a bit. Not like a Pixar movie that has been put in the compression machine to ensure every plot point pulls triple duty as developing character, developing themes, and setting up Checkov guns to fire later.

It’s also visually striking; the French countryside and life on the little barge is lovingly filmed. But probably the knockout image is the desperate, despondent Jean diving into the water, because he believes the urban legend that you can see your true love in the water. And there she is, in double exposure, her white dress eerily drifting through the water.

My favorite joke is the part when La Pere Jules is rubbing his finger along a record and, to his amazement, music plays. He does it again and again, and it works again and again. But eventually he realizes the boy (who seems to be some kind of apprentice on the barge?) is tricking him and playing the accordion in time with Jules finger. A bit embarrassed to have been caught out believing in the fantastic, he angrily retorts something along the lines of “there are stranger things than playing a record with a finger! Electicity eh! Or the wireless! Explain that!”

Why would someone think it’s one of the ten greatest movies ever made?

It’s basically a perfect little movie. Economical, unified, gesturing to the dimensions of wider life, while focusing intensely on the micro drama of two lovers, set in a unique time and place. Exploits the visual medium of film (and the new medium of sound too – a song is the key to how Juliette is recovered). It is a movie that, I think, would benefit from the improved technology to capture the color and texture of places though; for me, I really notice the shortcomings of 1930s camera technology when it is directed towards something like the beauty of the French countryside.

So why did I only give it 4.5 stars? I’m not sure, but it didn’t quite feel like something I really wanted to see again; though maybe if I did, it would grow in my estimation.

Next week: Modern Times