Paris Nous Appartient

Key early new-wave, 1961 from Jacques Rivette
ominous music and looming pans, moving in
often. especially earlier, camera that moves-in in a Hitchcock-like manner
often quite wide shots, but quick cuts
interesting use of montage, short bursts of one speaker, another pulled in by the cut
as though is suggesting the different relations between the longer take and the quick close-up
deep focus, quite a lot of depth
Wellsian influence here, as with the dramatic framings and often associative montage techniques
some wonderful framings, things just slightly off camera, then move
big mixture of techniques
general fragmented senses of space, especially among the bourgeoisie
often very empty streets; dislocation
use of not quite explained narrative, characters and audience both trying to create one
sense, with shadows in the background, of operating around ghosts, empty signifieds
About trying to understand a kind of reason for the madness, to explain the inexplicable
it is a slow, strange film
constructed around the life of the female lead, largely follow her
A fascinating hisotrical document, and still a perfectly decent film in itself