Film: Wild Grass
Release date: 8th November 2010
Certificate: 12
Running time: 105 mins
Director: Alain Resnais
Starring: Sabine Azéma, André Dussollier, Anne Consigny, Mathieu Amalric
Genre: Drama/Romance
Studio: New Wave
Format: DVD
Country: France/Italy
As Alain Resnais ages so do his regular cast members. Here, Sabine Azéma and Andre Dussollier reprise their familiar roles in the most recent of the octogenarian filmmaker’s offbeat romances. Based on Christian Gailly's novel L'Incident, the film focuses on the aftermath of a seemingly innocuous incident.
While shopping in Paris, Marguerite Muir (Azéma) has her handbag snatched by a rollerblading mugger. Georges Palet (Dussollier) subsequently finds her discarded purse and develops an inexplicably intense interest in her photographic ID and pilot’s licence. This leads to a series of one-sided phone calls and letters – straightforward but motiveless stalking, to all intents and purposes.
George’s intentions are never fully (or even partially explained), and there is something disconcertingly sinister about his obsession with the frizzy haired Marguerite – not least when he slashes her car tyres. Perhaps even more difficult to understand is why Marguerite suddenly becomes interested in her pursuer...
It’s an oddity of a film, even by Resnais’ opaque standards. The voiceover which narrates proceedings is lifted directly from the novel upon which the movie is based and is faithful to the original text, yet it reveals very little and poses more questions than it answers.
The character of Georges is deliberately mysterious – hardly an original concept – yet he is so enigmatic as to be frustrating. Occasional glimpses of murderous intent and his suspicion of those in uniform and their reciprocal distaste for him hint at a criminal past. But equally he could just be a bored fantasist with a runaway imagination. Refusing to divulge this information gives the film an ambiguity which makes it difficult to invest much in its central character – a flaw which could have been remedied if Marguerite was fleshed out more fully.
The stalked female lead is played with familiar skittishness by Azéma in a style well-known to those who’ve seen her previous performances in Resnais’ films. Sadly, the sketchy characterisation and baffling interest in her middle-aged pursuer make it difficult to warm to her. Even her kookily frizzy red hair seems like an affectation too far.
Despite the character flaws, it’s a stylish piece of work. The whimsical opening as Marguerite shops for shoes is wonderfully shot, with her face never revealed (just that hair!) even as she sees her handbag waving in the wind as it is snatched. It’s a stunning camera shot – a justifiable use of slow-motion and vividly contrasting colours.
Indeed, the film is full of colour, from Marguerite’s neon-lit apartment and gaudy yellow car to George’s lush green grass. The sets are as lavish as the characters are sparse and often shot in pastel-hued soft focus – even the turquoise desk at police HQ disappears into the fuzzy distance as Marguerite inquires after her pursuer.
Georges’ lawn is not the only grass which features in the film. Opening with tufts of greenery pointing through a cracked footpath, the action is interspersed with images of wild grass throughout. It’s difficult to say which of these represents Georges most accurately – does his well tended garden hint at the order he craves whilst being tempted to the wilder side of the untamed wild grass? Or has he arrived at order in his home life having eschewed the ‘wild’ side. Again, the movie’s ambiguity prevents an easy answer being reached.
If anything the film becomes less linear as it reaches its conclusion. Scenes which are presumably hypothetical are played out in the imaginations of the characters – these scenes within scenes occur in ‘thought bubbles’ which recall Resnais’ earlier film I Want To Go Home. A confusingly edited scene between Georges and two policemen descends into incomprehensibility as lines are repeated, and unusual cuts and zooms are employed to destroy any sense of conversation or convention.
The ending of the film is unsatisfying, but predictably so. After posing so many unanswered questions during the course of Wild Grass there was no way Resnais would cap it off with a conventional climax.
Wild Grass is lovely to look at but difficult to love. Resnais can be infuriatingly flippant, and here his stylistic quirks and tricks are not strong enough to carry the interest of the viewer from start to finish. A film requires characters and/or a plot strong enough to sustain the audience’s interest. Here, Resnais provides neither, and, as such, the film is a triumph of style over substance. RW
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