Guardian - 19 January 2018, 08:00 (+ 2294 days 16 hours and 28 minutes) Movies & TV
An emotionally distraught woman moves in with her father and his new live-in girlfriend in a subtle drama oozing with sex, jealousy and romanceLover for a Day returns the French film-maker Philippe Garrel to his evergreen – or evermonochrome – subjects of sex, jealousy and love. It’s co-scripted by his longtime collaborator Jean-Claude Carrière, that great screenwriter whose undimmed interest and skill in plot construction lends sinew to the movie. This brief, winsome feature is a typically stylish, if ephemeral piece of work in the classic New Wave manner – almost a time capsule. It is an intensely French film in which someone writes a post-coital message to their sleeping lover with lipstick on a mirror before leaving, without a trace of comedy or irony. The setting is the present day, and there’s a scene in which young people in a cafe talk about the immorality of war. Which war? Afghanistan? Iraq? Syria? No: the Algerian war, the one in the 1960s. Continue reading...