Not my favorite work by Resnais. What I liked the most about « L'Amour à mort » was the interpretation, especially that of Sabine Azéma, who gives herself 150% to her character, exploring all its facets, from her frenzy of panic to her final iron determination through all sorts of intermediate states. Pierre Arditi is amazing in a morbid role, in which he is not a specialist, to say the least. Fanny Ardant shows a welcome restraint in her role as a pastor while Dussollier is rather dull, in accordance actually with his character and his ready-made answers, taken from the Bible.
As for the direction, the editing and camera movements, they are, as always with Resnais, full of mastery and the whole thing is presented both in an experimental and traditional style (as of "Last Year at Marienbad" and "Melo" were juxtaposed in the same continuum). It, personally, got bothered by its experimental side, namely the musical inserts on a black background sprinkled with luminous flakes. They interrupt the thread of the narrative no less than... 52 times! With a music by Hans Werner Henze (nothing to do with "Pas sur la bouche" or "On connaît la chanson"!) which got on my nerves: for me the contemporary music score suggests too easily the psychic imbalance (which, in my opinion, should be present in the live sequences) while underlining in large strokes the "dialogue with the beyond". If one is sensitive to this score, there is no doubt that it will give an extraordinary relief to this "call from beyond"; unfortunately, it did not work for me, it only provoked irritation and constituted, by what I would qualify its pretentious abstraction, a brake to the emotion. Worse, these musical tableaux encroach greatly on the development of the story and prevent a psychological deepening, which would have contributed to a better adhesion: it would have been a good point for example to have Elizabeth's passionate love for Simon "felt" rather than given for granted. We know one thing about Simon: he is attracted to death, but what about his power of seduction over Elizabeth (and thus over the viewer)? We also know too little about his job as an archaeologist. The same goes for Elisabeth's job as a scientific researcher, we only get snippets of it. Didn't the passion about research (Simon's on the past, Élisabeth's for the future) bind the two lovers, at least partly though?
At first, I thought I would like the film without reservations, especially given the intensity of the opening: Simon's "false" death, his "resurrection", Elizabeth's distraught reaction. The rest of the film also resonated with me, when it came to the desire of the couple not to miss out on life, to live each moment of their existence to the full, to travel. But then came Simon's fascination for the "other side". A fascination I do not share at all. Those undefined creatures from that undefined « beyond » (a timeless elsewhere heavily symbolized by the river and its eddies) may attempt to attract me, like they do Simon, I won't heed their call. For what do they offer him once he has crossed the Styx? Not much in truth: nothing else but their vague company in the heart of a no man's land where after a terrible feeling of cold one feels good! A soft bliss, a stagnant beatitude, which looks very much like the paradise of religion and its eternal and unchanging happiness.
I felt like shouting "Take care of yourself, Simon, you have a young, lively, pretty companion, and you prefer joining these inconsistent specters!"
"And you, Elisabeth, what madness this Paschalian bet is, to die in order to eventually join (even if there is only one chance in a million!) your missing lover. This is nothing but the delusion of a sick mind. A completely insane hope".
I finally lost interest, mainly on account of Elizabeth's behavior, presented as the height of love-passion, as the summit of mad love, therefore as subject to admiration. I am afraid I do not admire Élisabeth. I respect her, I take note of her determination but do not approve of it. As Judith says, by dying to join Simon (with an infinitesimal chance of success), Elisabeth kills future loves, future children, of potential future beautiful things. The worst thing, she is apparently unaware of, is that by killing herself, she has a 99.9% chance of also killing... the memory of Simon. In my opinion, this collateral damage is a very bad move, not to be admired.
All in all, a very well directed and superbly acted film, but whose four characters remained light years away from me. It's probably because I don't share the fascination for death of Simon, Elisabeth, Resnais or the scriptwriter Jean Gruault (who had already worked in this register with "La chambre verte" for Truffaut). Of course, if you are fond of near-death, or even death, experiences, you will react differently.
