Les jeux de l'amour et du billard

You won't understand the pun that is the subject of this entry if you don't know Marivaux and if you haven't seen Three Times. Yes I went to the movies and saw an Asian movie (it's been  along time!). It isn't a film I'll cherish in my memory for ever but Hou Hsiao Hsien made some fine movie! It's worth seeing if only for the beautiful pictures and some neat ideas in the scenario.

That taiwanese film is divided in different times, a trick that is becoming usual in Asian films ("Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter and Spring"), but it could also call to mind classical plays even though there is no unity of time, nor of place. Yet there's some logic and some consistency going on through various connexions. First it's always the same main actors repeating the oldest history of times, between men and women. Shabadabada  Shabadabada.

The first time called "A time For Love" is set in 1966. The second, "A Time for Freedom", takes us back to 1911. Eventually we're in 2005 for the third time "A Time For Youth".

( 3 Times )