"Je T'aime, Je T'aime (1968, Alan Resnais), a rarely-seen science-fiction cult film, exercises the viewer's mind with superb style. As with the films of Jean Luc Godard, "Je T'aime" has a chaotic narrative which oozes with dystopian gloom. The non-linear structure is a bit fatiguing and frustrating. Still, I like it because of the arresting imagery and magnetic cast.Claude Ridder (played by Claude Rich), who has held many different office jobs, has recently survived a suicide attempt. When leaving the sanitarium, Claude is approached by creepy members of a secret organization which is conducting time-travel experiments. At the remote facility he is encouraged to allow the scientists to transport him back a year in time for a minute. The scientists tell him that they have successfully conducted this experiment with lab mice and now need him for the first human trial. A few days later, Claude and a mouse (in a small container) enter the Time Machine (which looks like a human brain from the outside). The Time Machine (TM) starts up. Woops—it immediately begins skipping like a dirty CD. While the scientists outside the TM lament their inability to stop it, Claude begins reliving short segments of his past randomly without end. He can exit the TM only after decompressing for four minutes; but the endlessly-looping Time Machine keeps interrupting the closing sequence. The repeated perspective of a large brain in the background with anxious scientists in the foreground worried about the brain's condition comments upon brainwashing.It takes a while, but Claude's often repetitive flashbacks eventually reveal why he attempted suicide. A year ago Claude was on a Scotland vacation when his comely girlfriend Catrine (Olga Georges-Picot) died. The two were an exceptionally attractive couple. Nevertheless, she had been the one was always seriously depressed (long before Claude was). The two represent different types of depression. Catrina seems to be bipolar; while occasionally happy she invariably finds little about life to make her struggle worthwhile. Claude's state of mind is more connected with Catrina's poor mental health and inevitable death. He harbors feelings of guilt out of the belief he killed her. The world-weary conversation between the two is usually compelling. Some of us wonder how exceptionally beautiful people can ever be suicidal. Catrina's enervated dialogue is even more heart-breaking when we consider that the stunning Olga Georges-Picot is playing herself. In real life, she struggled with depression for decades. (Unlike Claude Ridder's try, Olga Georges-Picot's 1997 suicide attempt did not fail.)Visually, Resnais is superb. His color choices and use of the entire frame are remarkable. One often has the feeling of being in an art museum when viewing some of the imagery on display. The haunting, Gothic (and possibly Satanic) soundtrack from Krzysztof Penderecki is also very distinctive.Catrina and Claude both share the belief that life is unendurable and look forward to an end to their suffering. Resnais has a cruel surprise in store for Claude: It turns out there won't be an escape to his torments. Cinephiles who don't mind putting in some effort should find out why. However, if you chose to arrive to the revival theater showing this by Time Machine please make sure it is under warranty.

Je t'aime, je t'aime (Alain Resnais, 1968, 91')My last film review for amazon (uk and us) was Vilgot Sjöman's I am Curious (Yellow- Blue) (1967-1968, 122'-93') of 30/5/2013 for amazon uk. Today's is my first review again after a nearly five month break. I mainly used the time to further develop my publication of "bloc notes", a cultural record, containing amazon film reviews, film book reviews and revIews of some Malaysia Philharmonic Orchestra (mpo) performances. My new film series (ie No 251 onwards) will first review a series of films which have been neglected for a variety of reasons, mostly unavailability of minimum quality copies. The reviews here are also meant to complement some earlier country or author series. - Now the movie:>>>In this provocative sci-fi drama from Alain Resnais, a man wakes up in a hospital after an attempted suicide. He has invented a time machine that has proved effective, but only transports the subject back in time for one minute. Upon his release, he gets his hands on the machine to go back to a time he fondly remembers spending with a woman he apparently has feelings about. The two stroll on the beach before she leaves for Scotland. He follows her, but tragedy ensues and it is not clear if he has killed her or if she died an accidental death. The time-machine angle of the film features a dreamlike series of flashbacks making it unclear if the action is presently unfolding or is merely a vague memory from the past. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi/IMDb<<<The Wikipedia free encyclopedia Alain Resnais article gives much more material on Resnais' work, but tends to overvalue his achievements, This film was meant to be presented at Cannes 1968, but expecting from radio news the chaos which then ensued, Alain Resnais broke his train journey to Cannes at Lyons and turned back to Paris. The festival was cancelled, the film was lost for a festival presentation and hence never really made it into the commercially relevant distribution circuit. Accordingly, it was near-impossible to get hold of a copy - no DVD's then, and DVD's now, but not released until very recently (I waited four years for it), still highly priced. The film was not worth any of these efforts. A bit nouveau roman, a bit love and death philosophy, the whole in a very old fashioned, very petit-bourgeois Belgian university environment, late Victorian, science hocus-pocus, but catholic? Acting flat, Claude Rich his worst, so Olga Georges-Picot, the rest of actors (if that is the word) an amateurish bunch of no skills. Bad, useless, horrible. Perhaps Resnais' worst.251 - Je t'aime, je t'aime (Alain Resnais, 1968, 91') -A miss for the miss, and the boys as well – 29/10/2013

A man (Claude Rich) is selected by a group of scientists to participate in a new experiment that involves time travel. It seemed to have worked with laboratory rats but since those can't speak they need to test with a human, in this case a man who is recovering from a failed suicide attempt after the death of his lover. As the researches claim, he's a perfect choice because he has nothing to lose. The tragic "guinea pig" thinks the same and joins the test, confining himself into a strange machine that goes back in time, although very jumpy, going back and forth without any logic, replaying facts of the man's life before his suicidal act. Most of the flashbacks revolve around the time spent with the woman he loved, good moments turned into painful memories to the subject trapped in the machine, who wakes up from time to time due to the project's malfunctions.Alain Resnais devotes his time here in presenting who the main character was instead of focusing in the utility of a time travel projects, which reveals to be quite empty since it's very risky, actions can't be altered, everything is doubtful and flawed. It deconstructs the character through random flashbacks, completely out of order and very repetitive, almost like waking up every morning in "Groundhog Day" (instead of punching the clock alarm, the recurring scene is a happier moment of the man coming out of the sea talking about the fishes he saw there, a tender moment with his lover). Sometimes it goes forward when it's time to explain what truly happened with his woman, by the time everything gets deeply confusing and a little more frightening. This movie's concept is great, but there isn't much gain when you don't have answers to some questions, and above all it's lack of a true purpose makes of "Je'Taime, Je'Taime" ("I Love You, I Love You") something remotely interesting, difficult to endure and more off than on. I loved the fact of this being a sci-fi movie that doesn't circulates with scientifical mambo jambo, it's more humanistic in this aspect. But in the real human level it's very brainy, exquisite, lacking in heart, passion and exceeding in small talks and distractive actions. I didn't fell anything for the couple, the fragments of what they had in common wasn't enough for me to develop any kind of feeling for them; the man, on the other hand, was a brilliant and tragic character with genuine emotions, slightly uncertain why he went ahead in joining the test, enjoying in revive the life he had but at the same time hating the awkward experience of not seeing things as they were, with clarity - the machine, the drugs taken interfere in everything, causing him some pain. We ask ourselves if we would do something like that. Technically fascinating with its unusual editing (for the time) but a little dead inside, this is a nice film that surely leaves you thinking but not much loving and dreaming and wanting more. Would benefit of an American remake, but too bad some would see it as a clone of "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind". 6/10

After having seen three films of Alain Resnais over the past few years 'Last year at Marienbad, 'Hiroshima Mon Amour' and 'Mon Oncle d'Amerique' I think he is a director well worth the effort to learn a little more about.Resnais plays with time here and films directly what happens in the conscious of the protagonist. Impossible to place in time and place a linear narrative from the short fragmatic bursts of scenes. Eventually these scenes, disposed and diced, give the mesh or framework leading to his eventual suicide attempt. To make things more confusing it is possible that some scenes are in fact his fantasies and he didn't live them at all.I like very much films that deal with time and space when handled by great directors. You leave the cinema often slightly confused as you are thrown back into reality. The film calls for a lot of reflection.