Wild Grass
- Directed by Alain Resnais
- Written by Alex Reval
- Starring André Dussollier, Sabine Azéma, Mathieu Amalric, Emmanuelle Devos and Anne Consigny
- (In French with English subtitles)
- Classification: PG
Revered French director Alain Resnais, now nearing 90, proves he still has spring in his step with the irrationally provocative romantic comedy Wild Grass, in which a married man and a lonely dentist engage in an odd, obsessive affair that, well, only people in a French New Wave movie would.
The film, which won Resnais a special jury prize at Cannes last year, will disorient some viewers. But with its comic-book hues, crime-caper score, overly serious narrator, interior monologues and surreal touches, Wild Grass proves Resnais is still having fun with cinematic language.
Like Resnais’s first two dramatic features, Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959) and Last Year at Marienbad (1961), Wild Grass depicts an unstable affair and is an emotional, rather than structural, narrative. We first see Marguerite (Sabine Azéma), a whirl of frizzy red hair, as her purse is snatched in a shopping mall. Her wallet is found that evening in a parking lot by Georges (André Dussollier), a man in his late 60s, outwardly elegant but experiencing early signs of memory loss. He’s also having dark, paranoid thoughts about murder (and we wonder if this is part of a mental breakdown).
Georges creates a fantasy about the wallet’s owner based on identification cards, the most intriguing of which is an aviator’s licence. When he tells his younger wife about the wallet, he is already behaving like a man guilty of having an affair. After Marguerite calls to thank him for returning the wallet to the police, Georges is outraged that she will not agree to meet. He starts sending long-winded letters about his life and even slashes her tires. His behaviour seems loony but in a Resnais film perhaps we don’t need to regard this literally. The balance shifts when Georges gives up his pursuit, and Marguerite fills the new gaping hole in her life by assuming the stalker role.
In the film’s final act, we warm to the idea these two eccentric people belong together – a feeling supported by the actions of Georges’s wife and Marguerite’s dentist colleague who condone their dramatic behaviour. As Wild Grass draws to a close, their fate is up in the air; Marguerite dusts off a vintage Spitfire she’s had restored (by a “chorus” of admiring mechanics) and takes Georges and his wife, quite literally, for a spin.
If you don’t know Resnais’s films, Wild Grass may set your head spinning but its playful spirit will keep your eyes and thoughts thoroughly engaged.
Wild Grass opens in Toronto and Vancouver today.
Special to The Globe and Mail
