Really intriguing structure; it took some time for me to really to get hooked, but damn, once I was in I was in. A bit melodramatic, but it works to great effect. Arguably a godfather to new wave, particularly in it's use of structure to evoke emotion over traditional narrative plot development.

For an older, abstract film with such a sense of melancholy to hold my attention as it did was odd. However, particularly after the poetic first act, moments of over performance on the part of the actors and camera dragged me out- although I can appreciate that the knowledge of the film being a representation, not a reality, was central to Resnais' film. Touching and a little repetitive, with an interesting perspective on war - I won't be in a hurry to watch it again.

While some of the dialogue is repetitive and comes off as a bit too pretentious, the setting, themes and effective use of flashbacks easily help you overlook the flaws. The powerful opening segment mixing death and suffering with intimacy and love really took me by surprise.

Exhausting to watch.

My favorite French New Wave. I'm interested in memory, and this film touches on it on a personal, cultural, and collective manner. There's something honest and unique about this one.

I really enjoyed how Resnais presents memory as something that defines your character and might also haunt you for years. This story about a woman who is afraid to forget her disturbing past and love again is dreamy and absorbing.

Parts were good and parts were bad. The romance was pretty uninteresting to me. The memory sections were interesting but got a tad repetitive. I like the perspective it gave on the dropping of the bomb during WWII, something I've never seen in a movie before or since. It just didn't click with me for whatever reason, I guess it's not my thing.

Visually, it's perfect. Unfortunately the love story and accompanying dialogue are pretty much a total bore. Hey, sometimes when you make the plot a metaphor for something more "meaningful," it doesn't completely work.

Even with extreme caution, Resnais's first feature can be called one of the most influential movies ever made. It had critics grasping for Proust or Bergson, and filmmakers grasping for the scissors, much more often, in the cutting room. And yet Resnais has afterwards managed to top this achievement with regularity.

not that good

This extremely melancholy, hour-and-a-half-long narration of a woman's life, whose audience is a man who asks her many questions in a stoic, wooden manner, does little to create a riveting story and does even less to produce good chemistry between the two lovers. Some poetic writing and good camerawork can't cover the film's dullness.

107

A very good film, but make no mistake it is quite dull to watch. Some may feel it is like watching two people fawn over each other for two hours. Eiji Okada plays a character whose mindset and actions are not in the least bit Japanese, which proves almost comical. But I have to give the film credit that it was at least partially shot in Japan.

"A rich art-house movie and one of the best of its kind, but its flaw is its subject matter."

perfect stranger:))

03 Temmuz 2011, sezi'nin onerisi & hafizanin yara kabuklari hakkinda bir film. duras'in etkisiyle ('mavi gozler siyah saclar' ne kotu bir kitapti!) anlatim ve ozellikle diyaloglar biraz fazla edebi bir hal almis.. ama bunun da filme siirsellik kattigini soyleyebilirim.

Delicately flirts with the paradoxical relationship between the self and memory: we are the culmination of collected remembered moments, yet we shape and distort them. Aspects of the film were awkward: the slightly obnoxious unconventionality; and the wooden expression of Okada Eiji (doing his best to speak in French). Overall however - when it focussed on being a film about love and memory - it was a really rewarding film experience with a beautiful restless mood.