The Story of Marie and Julien
(Histoire de Marie et Julien)

Screening on Film

Directed by Jacques Rivette.
With Emmanuelle Béart, Jerzy Radziwilowicz, Anne Brochet.
France/Italy, 2003, 35mm, color, 150 min.
French with English subtitles.

Twenty-seven years after the release of Duelle and Nor’west, Rivette revisits his mythical quartet with a film originally intended for Leslie Caron and Albert Finney (part four, a musical which was to feature Anna Karina and the late Jean Marais, has yet to be produced). Julien (Radziwilowicz) is a clock maker who is blackmailing a wealthy businesswoman (Brochet). He develops an intimate relationship with Marie (Béart) but is confounded by her inexplicably detached behavior. In the time since the original quartet was conceived, Rivette has downplayed the mythological concerns in favor of a somber supernatural love story.