Press Release Criterion Press Release: Two Films by Marguerite Duras (Blu-ray) (1 Viewer)

[Ronald Epstein]

​

Marguerite Duras had already established herself as one of the major figures of postwar French literature when she launched an equally fascinating and unclassifiable career in cinema, translating her elliptical, experimental style to the screen through an unprecedented fusion of hypnotic, highly stylized imagery and radically disjunctive sound. Boldly reimagining the possibilities of dialogue, music, silence, and architectural space, the tantalizing, sphinxlike evocations of soul-deep female malaise India Song and Baxter, Vera Baxter embody Duras’s singular multisensory approach, with each opening up new spaces for the expression of women’s interior worlds.

FILM INFO​

• Spine #1172

FILMS IN THIS SET​

• • 
    India Song
    
    1975
    Marguerite Duras’s most celebrated work is a mesmerizing, almost incantatory experience with few stylistic precedents in the history of cinema. Within the insular walls of a lavish, decaying embassy in 1930s India, the French ambassador’s wife (Delphine Seyrig) staves off ennui through affairs with multiple men—with the overpowering torpor broken only by a startling eruption of madness. Setting her evocatively decadent visuals to a desynchronized chorus of disembodied voices that comment on and counterpoint the action, with India Song Duras creates a haunted-house movie unlike any other.
  • 
    Baxter, Vera Baxter
    
    1977
    Marguerite Duras reunited with India Songcollaborators Delphine Seyrig and composer Carlos d’Alessio for Baxter, Vera Baxter, a hypnotically unsettling journey into one woman’s existential emptiness. Ensconced in a sprawling rental villa, the world-weary Vera Baxter (Claudine Gabay) receives visits from two women, including a mysterious stranger (Seyrig) to whom she recounts a shocking story about her marriage, the way she lives, and the reasons for her malaise. Setting her languid images to d’Alessio’s incongruously breezy, endlessly looping score, Duras fashions a quietly shattering portrait of marriage as a kind of prison.
    
    
    
    February 28, 2023

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Thank you for supporting HTF when you preorder using the link below. As an Amazon Associate, HTF earns from qualifying purchases. If you are using an adblocker you will not see link.

 

[Thomas T]

Finally! I've been waiting for India Song forever. I'm not waiting for any Criterion or B&N sale for this one. Immediate purchase!

 

[lark144]

Finally! I've been waiting for India Song forever. I'm not waiting for any Criterion or B&N sale for this one. Immediate purchase!

It was pretty paltry on DVD, fuzzy and pixelated, I think because the whole point of the film is this slow hypnotic dance between the actors and the camera in the middle ground of the image, which just doesn't come across in standard definition, as you need the additional detail for everything to be in focus, especially those subtle variations and colors. It looked really beautiful at the NYFF.

 

[jayembee]

Looking forward to this. I've read a couple of Duras's books, but I've never seen any of her films.

 

[lark144]

Looking forward to this. I've read a couple of Duras's books, but I've never seen any of her films.

INDIA SONG is a good place to start. It also improves with multiple viewings.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Preorder link added to post #2