
Un soir, un train (1968) aka One Night... a Train
Director: Andre Delvaux
Genre/Type: Drama, Psychological Drama
Artistic/Production Styles: Allegory, Non-linear
Tones: Enigmatic, Reflective, Moody, Meditative, Atmospheric, Dreamlike
Set In: Belgium, city
Color type: Eastmancolor
imdb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0063737/
Mathias (Yves Montand) is a Flemish professor who takes a vacation when the university students go on strike. He decides he will visit his mistress Anne (Anouk Aimee) to get away from the social and political upheaval. He finds that Anne has embraced the social causes despite an illness that could lead to her death. In a surrealistic scene, the two argue before Mathias boards a train. He meets Anne there, but the two are unable to communicate and she eventually vanishes. Mathias and two other strangers wander into a foggy rural area where they encounter revelers who dance and speak a strange language. It seems the train has wrecked and his girlfriend is dead, but the dreamlike expressionisms that flash forward and backward play tricks with the time and sequence of events. Soon Mathias and Anne are off to London, but the time period is unclear in this symbolic but unevenly scripted feature. — Dan Pavlides
Fabulous dreamlike movie.
The drama of incommunicability as never before,and never after.A couple ,Montand and Aimée, feels that their love is becoming a thing of the past.He is a linguistics professor,he reigns over words and culture;she does not understand the language they speak in this part of Belgium. One night,both take a train;suddenly it stops.Anne (Aimée) has disappeared ,and Matthias (Montand) gets out of the train.With two unknown guys,he sees the train silently and slowly moving ,like in a dream.The dream has begun.
Matthias and his two mates are left alone in the country.They arrive in a small village where,that crowns it,the university professor cannot understand a single world of the inhabitants' language.A very strange scene shows the three men coming into a tiny movie theater.On the screen,an odd,almost worrying film is projected:a parachutist floating in the air,sometimes shot in close-up,with an almost unbearable soundtrack.The audience seems to live in another world.Not only Matthias does not understand the language,but he does not understand their entertainment either .Then they go to a restaurant ,the staff of which seems to wait for them.Maybe..
When he returns to reality,Matthias will find out how selfish he has been with Anne.But it's a movie you can interpret in accordance with your sensitivity.Never a director has gone so far in intertwining dream with reality.The incommunicability of Matthias and the strange people of his dream echoes to that of the two lovers.But ,because of the harrowing conclusion,which leaves the spectator totally hopeless,perhaps this dream was an escape,or a way to delay what was ineluctable.André Delvaux gave us the best European movie of 1968.
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