Hiroshima Mon Amour [Criterion Collection]

MOVIE DESCRIPTION:

Alain Resnais's multi-award-winning Hiroshima, Mon Amour is neither an easy film to watch nor to synopsize, but it remains one of the high-water marks of the French "new wave" movement. Resnais and scenarist Marguerite Duras weave a complex story concerning a French actress's (Emmanuelle Riva) experiences in occupied France, juxtaposed with the horrendous ordeal of a Japanese architect (Eiji Okada) coping psychologically with the bombing of Hiroshima. These stories are offered in quick flashback vignettes, which permeate the contemporary story of the woman's relationship with the architect in contemporary Hiroshima. The characters are of the Then and the Now simultaneously, much like the famous watch that was dug out of the ruins of Hiroshima, its hands permanently affixed at 9:15. Resnais refuses to honor the traditional "unities" of film: we are never certain at any time whether we're watching the events of 1959 or of 1945. In truth, Hiroshima Mon Amour is not quite as inscrutable as certain critics would have us believe (the central theme of the importance of coming to grips with one's past comes through loud and clear), but it confused many filmgoers upon its first release, some of whom gave up the picture as a bad job and steered clear of all future Resnais efforts. Viewers are strongly encouraged to stay with this one from beginning to end; it won't be a smooth ride, but it will be an immensely rewarding one. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

DVD FEATURES:

• Number of Discs: 1
• Audio: Dolby Digital Mono
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 (Pre-1954 Standard)
• Screen: Black and White
• Features:
  • Audio Commentary By Film Historian Peter Cowie
  • Vintage Interviews With Director Alain Resnais and Actress Emmanuelle Riva
  • New Video Interview With Emmanuelle Riva
  • Excerpts From Marguerite Duras' Screenplay Annotations, Narrated Over Clips From the Film
  • Isolated Music and Effects Track
  • Illustrated 32-Page Booklet Featuring an Essay By Critic Kent Jones, Excerpts From a 1959 Cashiers du Cinema Round-Table Discussion About the Film, An Essay On Composer Giovanni Fusco by Russell Lack, and Character Portraits By Duras

AWARDS

• Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

•     Nominated Best Original Screenplay - 1960 (Marguerite Duras)

• British Academy of Film and Television Arts

•     Won United Nations Award - 1960 (Alain Resnais)
•     Nominated Best British Film - 1960 (Alain Resnais)

• Directors Guild of America

•     Nominated Best Director - 1960 (Alain Resnais)

• Hollywood Foreign Press Association

•     Nominated Best Foreign Film - 1960

• National Board of Review

•     Nominated Best Foreign Film - 1960

• New York Film Critics Circle

•     Won Best Foreign Film - 1960

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

• Cast:

  
       Emmanuelle Riva - She
       Eiji Okada - He
       Stella Dassas - The Mother
       Bernard Fresson - The German Lover
       Pierre Barbaud - The Father

• Director:

  Alain Resnais

• Producer:

  Samy Halfon

• Screenwriter:

  Marguerite Duras

• Cinematographer:

  Sacha Vierny, Michio Takahashi

• Composer (Music Score):

  Georges Delerue, Giovanni Fusco

• Editor:

  Henri Colpi, Jasmine Chasney, Anne Sarraute

• Production Designer:

  Esaka, Mayo, Petri

• Sound/Sound Designer:

  Pierre-Louis Calvet

REVIEW:

• Director Alain Resnais' tone poem on love, annihilation, and the need for compassion grafts the story of two lovers onto a larger philosophical treatise about the horrors of the atomic bomb. We know very little about the unnamed couple (Emmanuelle Riva and Eiji Okada) at the beginning of the film; Resnais is more interested in the fallout from sex -- the memories, regrets, and images that it can conjure, good and bad -- than in its logistics. Casually juxtaposing scenes of tranquility with graphic documentary footage of the aftermath in Hiroshima, Resnais stresses the importance of contact, nuance, and gesture amid the moment-to-moment uncertainty of a post-war world. Novelist-filmmaker Marguerite Duras scripted the film, which uses its interracial romance as a metaphor for international harmony. Resnais' deliberate, ponderous compositions set him apart from most of his New Wave peers, and he is aided by the legendary Sacha Vierny -- one of the few cinematographers who can make a museum visually compelling. Some critics found the film obtuse on its release, but the Academy thought enough of it to nominate Duras for Best Original Screenplay. The director would apply many of Hiroshima's non-linear storytelling techniques to 1961's L'Annee derniere a Marienbad. ~ Michael Hastings, Rovi