Last Year at Marienbad (1961)

Few films can take their viewer on a psychologically-complex ride without exhausting him. Alain Resnais’ 1961 film Last Year at Marienbad is one such rare gem.  Highly stylistic in visuals and radical in structure, Marienbad is a groundbreaking film, dealing directly with the conflict between fact and fabrication. 

While staying at a luxurious hotel, a woman (credited only as “A” and played by Delphine Seyrig) is approached by a man (“X”, Giorgio Albertazzi) who desperately tries to convince her of the passionate relationship the two had together at the same hotel just one year prior.

The film opens with repeating, echoey narration as the camera drifts through an elaborately-decorated hotel. The effect is instantly transfixing, almost hypnotic. We glide past sets of well-dressed people, never stopping, always moving on to the next group before hearing more than a tantalizing snippet of their conversation. This is much in keeping with the general tone of the film: just when the viewer thinks they’ve figured it out, we move on to another scene that undoes any resolution we have come to.

 Last Year at Marienbad blurs the line between reality and fantasy, memory and the present. There are flashbacks – but are they really? The narration doesn’t always match up with the flashbacks. Maybe what we’re seeing is the truth, and the narration is a lie? Perhaps the “flashbacks” are in fact only dreams, visualizations of the scenario “X” insists happened at that location one year before? The most unique aspect of this film is

that we never find out – it’s all up to interpretation.

Repeated dialogue, landscapes, and objects make the viewer feel as if maybe

they’ve been in this situation before. The film revolves around creating a sense of uneasy déjà vu. Even the other hotel patrons seem to be struggling to remember something.

This is a film that can be thoroughly enjoyed the first time, for the viewer has surely never seen anything like it before. For a more in-depth look at the themes, however, it merits several more viewings. Perhaps there is an answer – a key to the mystery surrounding these characters, but in the fifty years since its release, nobody has been able to definitively unlock this.

What make Marienbad most delightful are its brilliant visuals: gorgeous people wearing gorgeous clothes in a gorgeous setting, shot in gorgeous lighting. No film I have seen comes even close in terms of camera movement; Last Year at Marienbad must hold some kind of record for total number of dolly shots. Never distracting, it keeps the scenes from becoming stale by creating a sense of constant flow.

The editing is also remarkable. Resnais plays one entire scene in a wide shot, his actors against the breathtaking backdrop of an expansive garden and glimmering fountains. Near the end of the film, there are several very quick flashes to another setting as “A” begins to remember something. The effect is jarring, startling and confusing! – much like the complex workings of the human mind and its two branches of memory and imagination.