One of the special privileges of the cinema is the way it can step, effortlessly and imperceptibly, from the concrete and immediate to the abstract and universal-from object to metaphor and back again.
Nowhere, lately, has this special ability been more in evidence than in
”La Belle Noiseuse,” a four-hour film-and, unmistakably, a great one-by Jacques Rivette, one of the least publicized but most creative members of the French New Wave movement that also produced Francois Truffaut, Eric Rohmer and Jean-Luc Godard.
The central image of ”La Belle Noiseuse” is a classic and simple one-that of the painter poised before a canvas, ready to translate the form of the model who sits before him into art.
Rivette is able to take the three points of this triangle-man, woman, work-and explore every level of signification and every possible
interrelationship on a range that runs from particular psychologies to metaphysical speculations. Pursuing his ideas in depth, he never loses sight of his characters, and vice versa.
Edouard Frenhofer (veteran French performer Michel Piccoli, never better) is a once-revered painter who has faded from public view, having lost much of his interest in his work following his failure to compete ”La Belle Noiseuse” (an archaic phrase that roughly translates as ”the beautiful annoyance”), the painting that might have been his masterpiece.
Living quietly with his English wife, Liz (Jane Birkin), in a sprawling chateau in the south, Frenhofer is visited by a young painter, Nicolas (David Bursztein), whose work Frenhofer admires. But he is even more struck by Nicolas` companion, Marianne (Emmanuelle Beart, of ”Manon of the Spring”), a burstingly beautiful, sensual and willful young woman whose intensity inspires Frenhofer to take up ”La Belle Noiseuse” again, with Marianne as his model. Reluctantly, Marianne agrees to pose nude for the older man, hoping mainly to provoke some jealousy from her neglectful lover. But soon the relationship between artist and model develops an irresistible dynamic of its own, increasing in passion and fury as Rivette films, in a daring approximation of real time, Frenhofer`s slow progress from preliminary sketches to finished canvas. With the hand of painter Bernard Dufour doubling for that of Piccoli, we follow, in close and continuous shots, the creation of each image along the way.
Never has the process of creation been filmed with such concentration and patience; never has it seemed so dramatic, so gripping, so completely involving.
Having experimented with extremes of length throughout his career (his 1970 ”Out 1” runs 12 hours and 40 minutes), Rivette has learned that certain things can happen in a four-hour movie that can`t happen in a standard, 100-minute one-and that actual running time has little to do with the
spectator`s subjective experience of a film.
Because each event in ”La Belle Noiseuse” is given its full, proper weight, and because the leisurely pacing is so sure and profoundly pitched,
”La Belle Noiseuse” seems less long than many recent Hollywood productions, with their continuous, jittery assault on the viewer`s nerves.
The film has a powerful autobiographical component, in which the relationship between artist and model becomes a direct projection of that between filmmaker and performer. Piccoli has even adapted Rivette`s characteristic stutter and occasional absent stare, while Beart stands in for an entire group of actresses-Anna Karina, Bulle Ogier, Juliet Berto, Geraldine Chaplin-who have been the objects of his cinematic contemplation and the subjects of his private reveries.
For Rivette, the relation between artist and model-or director and actress-is in large part an erotic one: an agreement between voyeur and exhibitionist, of passive and active sensibilities, that produces a work of art. There is seduction involved, and considerable power games, though it is by no means clear in ”La Belle Noiseuse” who has the upper hand.
After a point, it is Marianne who drives Frenhofer on, forcing him to give more of himself just at the moment when he seems ready to abandon the project.
In its form, the film is quite symmetrical: It is divided into two 2-hour segments, each of which consists of one hour of group dramatic scenes, filmed in open exteriors, and one hour of posing, filmed in the closed interior of Frenhofer`s church-like studio. The movie begins with a marvelously light, floating sequence in which Rivette`s camera moves around a courtyard, introducing the characters as they play a game among themselves, and concludes three days later with the camera drifting through a similar courtyard, as the characters evaluate their experiences and plan for the future.
The film`s deliberate rhythm of open and closed spaces, of day and night and dialogue and silence, refers to a deeper rhythm of life and death, which is also contained in the relationship between the artist (he who steals and fixes) and model (she who offers and sustains).
This is not a film that can be exhausted in one viewing, and certainly not in one newspaper review (I`ll take another crack at it in Sunday`s Arts section). What it is is a masterpiece-a movie that will be remembered and discussed well into the next century.
”LA BELLE NOISEUSE”
(STAR)(STAR)(STAR)(STAR)
Directed by Jacques Rivette; written by Pascal Bonitzer, Christine Laurent and Rivette; photographed by William Lubtchansky; edited by Nicole Lubtchansky;
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production designed by Manu de Chauvigny; produced by Pierre Grise. An MK2 Productions USA release; opens Jan. 24 at the Music Box Theatre. In French with English subtitles. Running time: 4:00. Not rated by the MPAA. Nudity, adult situations.
THE CAST
Frenhofer…………………………………………..Michel Piccoli
Liz…………………………………………………..Jane Birkin
Marianne………………………………………….Emmanuelle Beart
Julienne………………………………………..Marianne Denicourt
Nicolas……………………………………………David Bursztein
The Painter`s Hand…………………………………..Bernard Dufour