l'amour régulier

Les amants réguliers is a film that's made 30 years too late.

What the audiences will remember in five years' time is without doubt William Lubtchansky's cinematography - an impeccable recreation of the 60's nouvelle vague atmosphere.

Alas, thinking back in time is what the film is all about - a love song for the splendor of nouvelle vague, and an elegy for the era's defunct ideologies. Love is instantaneous and immortal, while sheltering one's artistic talents is more important than traditional career and education. Soon talents and ambitions drown themselves in the young students' laziness, lack of realistic action, and superficial engagement with their lives. Haven't we seen all these before? The Dreamers? Actually let us not mention that horror show Bertolucci shamelessly put up. How about we go back to the year before the May 1968 event: Godard's La Chinoise? Or in that very year: Rivette's L'amour fou?

The first hour of Les amants réguliers is, in most parts, quite terrific. Riot scenes are created through vignettes of surreal cinema-verité panning shots. If reality could ever look unreal - then this is it. The ultra high-contrast lighting scheme recalls the look of Masculin féminin, while the elliptical structure recalls the best of Bresson.

Then all of a sudden, the movie starts to portray superficiality (always a required characteristic of the 60's youths), in a frustratingly superficial manner itself, unfortunately. Dream sequences are framed by a head-scratching scene transition that one might find most frequently in cartoons. Serious character moments and essential development of relationships are accompanied by Godard-like piano punctuations. Unlike Godard and Rivette, Garrel hardly gives us any heartfelt moments between characters (except for the last 10 minutes). Such consistency between superficial characters and superficial story-telling can only be lauded. Thankfully, Garrel spares the audience of blatantly offensive parallels to seminal films, although he does in one occasion have Clotilde Hesme look straight into the camera and deliver an incantation of Bernardo Bertolucci's name. This gesture seems more intimate and charged with a genuine passion for cinema - than the heavy-handedness of Bertolucci.

Nevertheless, if one were to look for accurate portrayals of the student dreamers and living-room revolutionaries, then Les amants réguliers is the definite film to see. I, on the other hand, would rather see L'amour fou again. Or even better, watch La Chinoise a few more times.