Jacques Rivette

It has "shifting meanings", so it is perhaps worth going to see it more than once.

Of course, I was there in Le Havre in 1971.

I thought it said Celine and Julie Go Roasting, because I have been watching Vicki Pollard and Cliff Maxford.

the nft could have done better than have that poindexter roddick do the prog notes. but i would like to try 'out one'.

nft patrons are esp. intolerant of snoring in my experience

Steady Mike might know why. He might know how much 12 hours of sous-titrage would cost as well.

Oh, if only those first 6 words were true.

There's a series coming to NY featuring Out 1 which I will do my best to miss.

http://www.anthologyfilmarchives.org/schedule/?start=2006-4-22&end=2006-4-30

Rivette = not a big fan of Scorsese, so I'm guessing he wldn't be too enthused abt Mann either

desperately seeking susan = the american remake of C+J, if that's any help!

but both films do have a scene w/ two chicks performing tricks

An Elusive All-Day Film and the Bug-Eyed Few Who Have Seen It
By DENNIS LIM

IF there is a movie equivalent of reading Proust or watching the "Ring" cycle — of committing to an artwork of overwhelming proportions that promises to repay accordingly — it's likely to be found in the films of the French New Wave veteran Jacques Rivette. In a 50-year career Mr. Rivette, a master of the marathon running time, has never made a feature under two hours. (Three or four is more typical.) And in the annals of monumental cinema — a category that includes Andy Warhol's avant-garde provocations, Marcel Ophuls's patient portraiture and Bela Tarr's long-take miserablism — there are few objects more sacred than Mr. Rivette's 12 1/2-hour "Out 1: Noli Me Tangere."

Shot in the spring of 1970, this fabled colossus owes its stature not just to its immodest duration but also to its rarity. Commissioned and then rejected by French television, the film had its premiere on Sept. 9 and 10, 1971, at the Maison de la Culture in Le Havre before receding into obscurity. Hoping to salvage a version for theatrical release, Mr. Rivette, now 78, whittled down his eight-episode, 760-minute serial into a 255-minute alternate cut, which he called "Out 1: Spectre."

"Spectre" has been difficult but not impossible to see. "Noli Me Tangere," meanwhile, has become a true phantom film whose reputation rests on its unattainability. Its title (Latin for "touch me not") seems to predict its fate: an apt one, given that many of Mr. Rivette's films are predicated on obsessive and perhaps futile quests.

This cinephile's holy grail slipped into sight earlier this year when the National Film Theater in London announced a sweeping Rivette retrospective. Its centerpiece was a screening of "Out 1: Noli Me Tangere" on April 22 and 23. (Anthology Film Archives in Manhattan, by coincidence, chose the same weekend to give "Out 1: Spectre" its first New York screening in decades.)

So just how rare is the original "Out 1"? The National Film Theater program claimed it had been "unseen since its one and only screening in Le Havre." David Thomson, in his Biographical Dictionary of Film, notes that it was "never shown properly without mechanical breakdown." The critic Jonathan Rosenbaum reported a sighting at the 1989 Rotterdam Film Festival, where 45 minutes of its soundtrack was missing. Mr. Rosenbaum said that Mr. Rivette cut 10 minutes from the film after Rotterdam. That 750-minute version quietly surfaced at a few European festivals and on French cable television, then disappeared again.

It seems certain, at any rate, that the recent London screening was the film's first presentation with English subtitles. It was, in other words, a big enough deal to inspire a pilgrimage (whose numbers included this writer). With a hushed anticipation, more than 100 of the faithful filed into a darkened room on an incongruously sunny London morning, ready for the long haul. The spectacle that unfolded over two days was, as advertised, unique in movies: an adventure and a hallucination. As time elapses, the viewer succumbs to waves of delight and disorientation, exhaustion and exhilaration.

Among other things, "Out 1" concerns the parallel efforts of two theater companies to put on Aeschylus plays ("Prometheus Bound" and "Seven Against Thebes"). Two oddball loners (Jean-Pierre Léaud and Juliet Berto) separately circle the groups. Characters change names and reveal secret identities. Living Theaterish rehearsals go on for ages. Connective tissue fills in, only to fall away. Mr. Léaud's character is the thickening mystery's self-appointed detective, fixated on cryptic messages about a 13-member secret society, a subplot that Mr. Rivette borrowed from the Balzac suite of novellas "History of the Thirteen."

Building on his improvisational experiments of "L'Amour Fou" (1968), Mr. Rivette worked without a script, relying instead on a diagram that mapped the junctures at which members of his large ensemble cast would intersect. The actors came up with their dialogue; the only thing Mr. Rivette actually wrote were the enigmatic notes Mr. Léaud's character receives. In a 1999 interview Mr. Léaud described the director's methods as "vampiric."

"Out 1" uses documentary techniques — uninflected observation, unscripted situations — not to capture reality but to generate fiction. For Mr. Rivette, narratives — or, more precisely, our hunger for them — can be dangerous. In his best-loved film, "Céline and Julie Go Boating" (1974), a giddy parable on the pleasures and perils of storytelling, the heroines are literally thrust into a haunted house of fiction.

Mr. Rivette's fondness for shadowy conspiracies and paranoid fantasies, which owes a debt to Balzac and the sinister daydreams of the silent-era serialist Louis Feuillade, dates to his first feature, "Paris Belongs to Us" (1960). With "Out 1" he found the perfect match of form and content, an outsize canvas for a narrative too vast to apprehend. In a 1973 interview Mr. Rivette described the film's creep from quasi-documentary to drama in ominous terms: the fiction "swallows everything up and finally auto-destructs."

Mr. Rivette and Jean-Luc Godard were the two major French filmmakers most visibly galvanized by the student riots of May 1968. While Mr. Godard grew overt in his militancy, Mr. Rivette set about on a subtler but no less anarchic course. Much of his 70's work stems from a radical impulse toward destruction and renewal.

The director Claire Denis, who worked with Mr. Rivette in the mid 70's and later made a documentary about him, spent an afternoon on the set of "Out 1" as a student. "Everything was political then," she said in a telephone interview. "Making the film was political. So was watching it." She has fond if somewhat dim memories of the legendary 1971 screening. "It was like an acid experience," she said. "Everyone was more or less stoned."

"Out 1" now seems a relic of a bohemian heyday, a time when you could spend your days rehearsing ancient Greek plays or making 12-hour films. But even in 1970 that hazy idyll was already fading. The film takes its shape, as Mr. Rosenbaum has noted, from "the successive building and shattering of utopian dreams." An epic meditation on the relationship between the individual and the collective, "Out 1" devotes its second half to fracture and dissolution. But it's not a depressing film, perhaps because its implicit pessimism is refuted by its very existence. Experiential in the extreme, "Out 1" cannot help transforming the solitary act of moviegoing into a communal one.

New Yorkers looking to dive in will not have to wait long. "Noli Me Tangere" is set to make its United States debut at the Museum of the Moving Image's Rivette retrospective in November. By way of warm up, Anthology concludes its small Rivette series this weekend with the 70's rarities "Noroît," "Duelle" and "Merry-Go-Round."

Mr. Rivette is still a vital and unpredictable force. The feature he's currently shooting, "Don't Touch the Axe," bears a titular resemblance to "Noli Me Tangere" and will apparently revisit Balzac's "History of the Thirteen." Does this represent a closing of the circle? An expansion of the master plan? If there's one thing we know from Mr. Rivette's films, it's that the big picture will remain just outside our grasp.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

spending so much time with the lead actors - leaud, bulle ogier, juliet berto, the absolutely superb michael lonsdale - builds a completely different level of recognition/empathy/reflection than one normally experiences w/ narrative cinema of 'conventional' length - and at the end we were left with an incredible, inexplicable and unexpected feeling of loss (I actually heard someone behind say "is that all there is?" at the end!), so much so that i had to return for the 'shorter' (4 and a half hour) Out One: Spectre, where the narrative is re-arranged, re-shaped and re-directed - a fascinating lesson in the relatively arbitrary nature of narrative film construction

all in all, a life-changing experience

the 13 hour print, divided into 8 segments, had a 1990 copyright date but was already pretty fucked/shagged (tho' not quite as bad as the disintegrating print of L'Amour Fou the BFI used - now there's a film in URGENT need of restoration) - however Out One:Spectre was a nice-looking non-grainy restoration, the better to see the sadness in juliet berto's eyes+smile

la belle noiseuse has been on terrestrial tv a cpl of times - lotsa nudity in that! - and BBC 2 once screened an early 80s Rivette called L'Amour Par Terre (not one of my faves, despite the great geraldine chaplin being in it) - C4 may even have shown Celine and Julie back in the 'glory days'.

Artificial Eye have released a few of the later Rivettes on DVD

C4 also had TWO Godard seasons back in the 80s/90s - one of them was esp. good for those hard to find documentaries/polemics that JLG was making after La Chinoise, as well as the awesome Histoire Cinema series - but again, DVD is yr best bet these days

http://www.cahiersducinema.com/IMG/gif/LAMOURFOU.gif

Wiki lists his movies and ile has a few mentions, just wanted some recommendations of anything that might be available.

It's funny, Rivette's working method/choices/events-staged before camera all seem to suggest 'democracy-in-action' - he's very interested in community-gangs-groups, and Out One is like the last gasp of post-68 collective dreaming - but by all accounts he's quite a strong-willed auteur (which I guess you wld need to be to get these monsters made...)

Seeing the full Out One remains my cultural highlight of the year, any year

Gotta say I'm quite interested in the theatrical traditons (or experimental theatre) that have worked themselves into his movies (something touched on the discussion in the DVD extra). But these are all questions for another time..

Also I see Film Four are showing 'Celine and Julie..' as their late late movie on tuesday.

http://movingimage.us/site/screenings/mainpage/rivette.html

"box dinner available" for Out 1! Lots of coffee I hope.

what means this?

i watched Celine and Julie the other night on film4. much funnier second time round, also it was surprisingly suited to TV viewing because you don't have to give it 100% of your attention.

I generally love Sandrine Bonnaire, so I just reserved Joan the Maid at the library.

what i love about celine and julie is that no matter how long Rivette is stretching the whole thing out for it's never so long that he won't throw in another leghty, pointless and just plain funny digression. coming up for the three hour mark there's a needless plot development which involves the sweets running out and C&J having to steal a book from the library so that they can make up a potion. for some reason they have to steal the book wearing wetsuits, balaclavas and rollerskates (hott). the other night this struck me as the funniest thing ever whereas first time round i just found it frustrating. what changed?

The Nun is getting a minor re-release over here and I've never seen it. Curious to see what Karina does with it.

There is a North American DVD of Gang of Four. I've had it for 15+ years and I'm shocked to find that it's still available:

https://www.amazon.com/Gang-of-Four/dp/B00005TNF8/

And it's great! See it.

The Nun is his most "conventional" feature and not among my favourites, but still very much worth watching.

In the UK you can currently buy Gang of Four, Wuthering Heights and Love on the Ground on DVD for £3 each.

Gang of Four is indeed very great, but is so quintessentially Rivettian that I can't imagine it pleasing a Rivette sceptic like the good Doctor M.

Agree w/ you about The Nun - a Rivette adaptation of Diderot text starring Anna Karina sounds like the best thing ever, but the actual film is a bit lumpy and dull.

Gang of Four is really good, love that film.

i went to some silent shorts instead

On brand

presumably i will run across either the Go4 disc or a 35mm screening someday

Lots of Rivette films have their double or pair, and the film that I would pair w/ Gang of Four - as its echo inverse etc - is L'amour Fou, the film Rivette made after the disaster of The Nun, also w/ Bulle Ogier and (as I habitually say on this thread) in desperate need of a proper restoration. When I first got into Rivette, investigated his entry in Thomson's Biographical Dictionary, borrowed Jonathan Rosenbaum's scarce BFI mongraph on JR from the old BFI library, I seriously thought I would probably never get to see the complete Out One in my lifetime, and now it is easy to see in high definition, everywhere. So, one day!

"The Nun" is a favorite of mine but it's still a pretty big left turn after "Paris nous appartient", for me, and even though stagey feels the least Rivette of all his films.

All the sapphic habit-diving in the last third of The Nun is borderline risible, but I liked it more than is typical with me and JR. The story of its banning is at least as compelling. (Mme de Gaulle did it)

exciting opportunity to watch out 1 in london

https://www.closeupfilmcentre.com/film_programmes/2019/jacques-rivette-out-1

I'm guessing that this is a screening of the digital version that Arrow and others have released on Blu-Ray in the last few years, possibly timed to coincide w/ a new standalone Out 1 set w/ both versions of the film:

https://arrowfilms.com/product-detail/out-1-blu-ray/FCD1886

Still no sign of L'Amour Fou though!

Have a chance to see Duelle for free at a newly opening theater in Seattle in a few weeks.

so watched the full out 1 over the weekend, and still unsure how I feel about it. contrary to what most people’s experience seems to be, I found the extended theatre exercises to be the most captivating; observing the evolutions and magnetism of people, pushing and pulling, growing and deflating — and the moments where what little we learn in the external sequences seem to infect these communities.

i was never bored but frequently frustrated, a feeling that only grew as i realised the whole thing was an improvisational exercise and the total absence of a defined reality, just the world as the individual actors understand it. the sense of lost promise is so strong and I left the cinema on the verge of anger, but living more and more with what it is, am only finding it more fascinating. been thinking of it as a komboloi, something to hold with you, thread through your hands, feel individual moments it as you go about your life, idk looking forward to growing with it

is there an obvious movie to start with this guy? out 1 seems daunting.

just realized his photo is featured a couple times in The Image Book

His most popular is Celine et Julie, after which you can pick others based on whether you like that or not.

Paris Belongs To Us is essential Nouvelle Vague, and shorter than usual for him.

Yeah, Celine et Julie or perhaps La Belle Noiseuse. That one isn't that typical, but it's very easy to watch. Though a lot of the popularity has to do with the very large amounts of nudity in it, I suspect.

Paris Belongs to Us is really mysterious and beautiful and is amazingly confident for a first feature-length film

haven’t seen any other Rivette films yet besides his first and now his last, Around a Small Mountain. it’s interesting that his last film was so straightforward. wondering about the arc in between

more like a rollercoaster

a frequently quiet and/or tedious one

people who have nothing to do and nowhere to go

Finally saw La Belle Noiseuse and found it totally enthralling, and singular and mature among his films I've seen. It avoids most of the pitfalls I half-expected it to fall into when I first heard about it years ago. No clumsy eroticism; It takes the work seriously without veering off into exaggerated or doofy paens to Art. I don't know if you could even call their relationship a battle of wills. They could be two co-workers butting heads over the design of a building or machine. Loved it.

A recent YouTube upload - a subtitled print of L'amour Fou (seemingly sourced from a video) - the image quality might be tough to take over four hours:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLXKgDCSuJ0

It's my favourite of his!

It's great, except for the director wearing his sunglasses under his chin for most of the duration.

this (by jacques rivette) is the funniest piece of film criticism ever written, in that it somehow massively insults three completely unrelated directors and makes jacques demy look like a nerd pic.twitter.com/Xsu6LFtWZX

— axaxaxas lmaö (@demarionunn) December 29, 2021

from: https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2001/jacques-rivette/rivette-2/

Here's your Rivette news for Spring 2023...

-So far this year, Cohen has released four films on Blu-ray: L'Amour par Terre, La Bande des Qautre, Haut Bas Fragile, and Secret Defense.

-The "version longue" of Va Savoir (3h 45m) was restored in 2021 and has surfaced on the French streaming service UniversCine. A title card about the restoration describes it as the "first version" of the film. You can watch it if you have a VPN and 1 Euro to spare for a month's trial. No subtitles though.

-L'Amour Fou has been restored and is being shown at Cannes. Info and clip here: https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/f/l-amour-fou/. Hopefully Blu-ray to follow eventually!

MUBI's got the Joan films. Watch'em, right?

Yeah, it’s really good!

I saw them both at TIFF in 1994 and found them his most tedious films, then I saw the cut-down version and quite enjoyed it. I suppose a final judgement is yet to come.

No hurry

the first is absolutely incredible, a great marxist film (in the historiographical sense), while the second might be my least favourite rivette

assume these are the recent restorations? for fans of dappled light, the exterior scenes in part 1 are possibly the best work lubtchansky ever did

Great news.

L'amour fou, restored in 4K, coming to UK cinemas in 2024

Trailer: https://t.co/VbCjrXVht1

Check out our new poster 👇 pic.twitter.com/NvnAYFIQ3X

— Radiance Films (@FilmsRadiance) December 22, 2023

I’ve been lucky enough to see this twice (projected at Lincoln Center and MoMA) before the restoration was announced, and it’s really a godsend - the first time I saw it was from a pristine looking print, but the second time (just a couple of years ago) was missing an entire reel that had to be replaced with a crummy old video transfer. That was in addition to the visible damage around the reel changes, so it’s probably been awhile since a decent English-friendly print has circulated.

Only seen it as a torrent rip so really looking forward to it

I call it great upthread, but I really don't remember this one too well. He's a director who "should" be in colour for me.

FWIW, one thing that probably gets lost in video rips is that he shot the film in 35mm and 16mm (the rehearsals are in 16mm, and you can even hear the camera motor, like so many of the classic cinema verite films back in the day). The visual differences should be very apparent when you see this in theaters.

Details about the Radiance Blu Ray of L'Amour Fou (take my money etc)

https://www.radiancefilms.co.uk/products/lamour-fou-le

This weekend: https://www.ica.art/films/lamour-fou-4k

Nice. Like the trailer they've made:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SW2XWbzFCyw

I saw it in Vancouver a couple of weeks ago. Highly recommended. Very poorly attended - I went to the first of two screenings and there were about 12-15 people there, and I think a few left at the interval. The last time I saw it was at the same venue back in 2007 (I think) on a very poor print.

It bore the Janus Films logo... maybe it will be released by Criterion, or at least they'll feature it on the channel.

It's coming out on Radiance! Thus the trailer above.

Yes, I preordered that - looks like a great package with some nice extras. But it's Region B so just speculating that there might also be a North American Criterion release.

The screening at the ICA was nearly sold out.

I saw a poor torrent rip of this 10 years ago and didn't get as much out of it as in this viewing as you just don't have to work so hard.

Interesting how this and "La Maman et la Putain" got a clean up and re-release in the same year, as they are of a similar vein. Though here the relationship disintegration is set alongside a piece of art coming together. A strangled death and a painful birth. The half an hour destruction of the flat as the couple try to rebuild their relationship looks forward to "In the Real of the Senses" too.

Probably the film in which he became a really great filmmaker.