LE PONT DU NORD B-
France (131 mi) 1981 d:
Jacques Rivette
An extension of an earlier short film called PARIS S’EN VA
(1981), this appears to be a riff on one of Rivette’s most successful films, Céline
and Julie Go Boating (Céline et Julie vont ... (1974), one of the most
uniquely original films the director ever made, following the exploits of two
theatrically minded young girls as they create their own Alice in Wonderland experience while we watch them romp through the
hallucinogenic worlds of their imaginations while racing through the streets of
Paris. The ecstatic and uplifting tone
of the original, an endlessly inventive treat throughout, becomes instead a
darkly menacing, nightmarish world where the suffocating atmosphere literally
chokes the life right out of this world.
Perhaps as a response to the infamous puzzle game experimentation in the
mind-altering Alain Resnais film Last
Year at Marienbad (L'Année Dernière à Marienb... (1961), Rivette invents his
own board game, using famous monuments and locations in the streets of Paris as
possible places to land, using characters as living pieces moving about the board,
seemingly at random, interacting throughout.
While you might think there’s a catch to figuring out this puzzle by
following the clues, but that’s simply out of the question, as it’s not a
detective whodunit, it’s simply a meandering journey through a decaying
existential wasteland. While the film
appears to be thrown together at the last minute, shot cheaply and quickly by
Caroline Champetier and William Lubtchansky on 16 mm, perhaps the best thing in
the film is Rivette’s exquisite use of vacant lots, construction sites, an
endless series of stairs, and rarely seen off-locations, like abandoned
railroad tracks and demolition sites.
Into this world Bulle Ogier is Marie, while her real-life daughter
Pascale Ogier is Baptiste, meeting seemingly at random on the streets of Paris,
as Baptiste keeps appearing wherever Marie goes, so eventually they continue
their journey together, but not before Baptiste announces an opening battle
cry, “Bring it on, Babylon” as she rides her motorbike circling around the
statue of the Belfort lion (1,280
× 830 pixels) situated at the center of the Place Denfert-Rochereau, a
symbol of French Resistance against the Germans, and the site where we first
see Marie. But the Babylon Pascale
references is the looming presence of a corrupt city destroyed by its own
materialism and greed.
Throughout the film, there are images of giant construction
cranes looming off in the distance constructing new buildings while also
demolishing dilapidated structures at a rapid pace, where the world is
simultaneously building what it will eventually destroy. Marie is happy to see her boyfriend Julien, Pierre
Clémenti from Buñuel’s BELLE DE JOUR (1967), playing another lowlife gangster
who seems to be saddled with nothing but troubles, where two men seem to be
following him around the city, giving him 3 days to produce what they’re
looking for. While Marie and Julien
constantly meet in various locations, Julien can’t disappear fast enough, as if
he can’t be seen in public. At the same
time, Marie was recently released from prison, where she suffers from a rare
medical condition that doesn’t allow her to breathe “inside air,” as she’s
become addicted to fresh air, where she’s even forced to sleep outdoors. While you’d think this clever interplay
between characters is well set up, no one makes a lasting impression on the
audience, where unlike CÉLINE AND JULIE, each sequence is near
forgettable. Rivette tries to create a world
of mystery and invention, feeling like a claustrophobic parallel world where
they have fallen into set traps, often languishing in a state of limbo as the
days pass by. Baptiste runs interference,
as if protecting Marie from dangerous outsiders, but we never get any clear
indication who she is or what she’s doing here.
For that matter, all of the characters appear out of a cheap Godard gangster
flick playing their respective good and evil roles, where the heavies are all
named Max and exist only to exert a noirish sense of danger, while the two
women continually appear clueless and innocent, as if they could render no harm
to anyone, so why do they exist in this labyrinth of doom? Surrounded by dark secrets and lethal
threats, where soon enough dead bodies surface, Pascale finds a secret map
stuffed into the dead man’s pockets, as if this is the treasure map leading
them out of their imprisoned existence.
While this map gives them a chance to explain the rules of the game, it
doesn’t generate any real interest in the film, which simply never gets off the
ground.
This is a film that suffocates in its own film construction,
where outside of its presumed puzzle existence, it becomes a road movie with
two characters wandering endlessly through deserted sections of the city,
continually questioning their own crumbling existence, never really finding a
reason for coming to life onscreen. Made
not long after suffering a nervous breakdown, the film does seem to be
searching for a reason to live, but these are instead dead souls doomed to
wander perpetually through the ends of time, meeting at their designated times
and stations, passing back and forth various documents and information from a
briefcase, setting up their next designated appointments. Eventually this begins to feel ludicrous,
where even the secret language starts to resemble film noir code, where danger
always lurks just around the corner.
When Pascale is called upon to slay a carnivalesque dragon, which
breathes fire and smoke just for effect, it veers into the territory of fairy
tales and children’s stories, but just as quickly starts questioning its own
raison d’etre, as if these characters are caught up in their own dreary state
of malaise and can’t escape their self-inflicted philosophical conundrums, even
with the aid of the secret map. The film
fizzles out and meanders on too long, simply running out of gas, losing a sense
of purpose and dramatic conflict, as it all feels silly and repetitive after
awhile, where the absurdity of the rules don’t even begin to make sense, as in
this imaginary state, there is no reason for existence other than to
continually make random appointments with destiny, where some larger mystery
engulfs them, as if fate has already decided the outcome, and they’re mere
puppets playing out the parts. In road
movies, it’s the journey that matters, not the eventual destination, but here
they are caught up in a realm of Sisyphus, destined to repeat their jagged path
across an urban wasteland, up and down stairs, through vacant lots, only to
discover no opportunity to start over and begin anew, where they’re stuck
finishing what they started, where perhaps it was only a blind dream that Marie
was released from prison, as her fate is apparently sealed.
