Un soir, un train [One Night, a Train] (André Delvaux, 1968)
Mar
20
French Language Day
Mathias (Montand) and Anne (Aimée) walk through a round archway. Both have a different focus and are on opposite sides of the arch as a foreshadowing of their parting. DP: Ghislain Cloquet.
A Walloon language professor and his French set designer fiancée are at an impasse. While his Flemish students vocally protest against more Walloon influence at their uni, the couple – who superficially speak the same #language, #French – struggles to find the right words. They meet, part ways, then find each other again on a train that at morning turns out to be standing still in the middle of nowhere. The man, now without her, disembarks and with two acquaintances who also were on that train tries to find out where he and she are.
André Delvaux's Un soir, un train is a masterpiece about finding the right language in a fractured world.