Synopsis
Inspired by the dominant motif of the novel by the great Austrian writer Adalbert Stifter, "L’Arrière-saison" is a diptych about roses.
2007 ‘L'arrière-saison’ Directed by Philippe Grandrieux
Inspired by the dominant motif of the novel by the great Austrian writer Adalbert Stifter, "L’Arrière-saison" is a diptych about roses.
A French post-modern philosophically-tinged diptych of Rainbow Brite and the Star Stealer, itself a post-modern philosophically-tinged template of mankind attempting a unity of pollination from a distinctively over-recognizable form in aesthetics--the pony tail. It seems built to collude with Ben Russell's history of photosynthesis' multiplicity before the sun flares went and ruined outdoor minimalist theatrics, at least for a time. Kinda fun, kinda like a travelogue of tourists climbing a famous Taoist mountain, twice.
Nothing wrong with this short work from Grandrieux at all, but if I want to see aggressive nature photography I'll stick with Rose Lowder's Bouquets where things move a little more kinetically.
Incredibly alien filmmaking. What Philippe Grandrieux has done here is far beyond the realm of cinematic documentation, finding itself deep in an area of foreign probing. What begins as a simple look at a flower quickly delves from hypnotic to psychotic.
For a film composed of nature it's filmed with incredible aggression. The circling of the flowers sits at an ambiguous point between surveying and sizing up, inexplicably recording and assessing in great detail what otherwise feels so minute.
The images do not flow with grace. They are purposely shuttered, and the observational quickly descends into a perversely fierce fixation. The incredibly tight angles shatter the expected notion of intimacy, feeling confrontational and inexplicably violent. Paired with the dystopian drone of a landscape gutted of all except uncomfortable silence and distant bird chirps, it's truly otherworldly cinema.
La forma en que la cámara se siente atraída (incluso poseída) por la imagen principal de la rosa es tan hipnótica como aterradora. Veo cada secuencia como una comunicación entre la vida y la muerte o incluso la resurrección. En la primera toma, la rosa es hermosa y majestuosa, se mueve con el viento y siempre en sentido opuesto a las ramas. Después, algo sucede. El cielo se cae y la "misma" rosa parece estar muerta, con su belleza robada. No es fea sino oscura ahora. Y luego, las también oscuras ramas de los árboles la dejan descender a través de sí misma para convertirse en un fantasma. Su imagen resucita y es aniquilada de nuevo.