Julien is a loner who restores antique clocks. He is blackmailing the rich and mysterious Madame X who trafficks in fake antiques. By chance he encounters Marie, the beautiful woman with whom he fell in love one year earlier. Julien attempts to rekindle the affair but is unsettled by the enigmatic Marie's strange and distant behaviour. Only Madame X holds the key to unlock Marie's terrible and devastating secret.
The story unfolds almost trance-like, where clear divisions between dream and reality are uncertain. Julien first dreams of his encounter with Marie and then they meet in person. Both have recently lost their lovers. Julien seems to be frozen in time and place. He lives and works in a house where clocks abound, yet time seems to have deserted his life. Marie explains that she is waiting, having returned from a faraway place in order to repent for a wrong she committed against her former lover, now dead, leaving her unable to accomplish her task. As their relationship develops and they fall in love, Marie begins to use Julien as a proxy for her former lover, hoping to win his forgiveness and thus release. Working both consciously and unconsciously, directed by her dreams, Marie's behaviour becomes increasingly bizarre.
Madam X, who meets Marie during a blackmail payoff, immediately identifies the situation, drawing parallels between her own sister and Marie. She shares her knowledge with Julien, who after some research into Marie's past, is able to piece together her story, deciding that it matters little to him. The facts, whilst astounding, make no difference to his love for her but their relationship is left at an impasse. Since life without her would now be unthinkable, Julien is willing to do anything for Marie, either she will stay with him or he will follow her. Eventually, Marie decides she must accept her punishment for failure, rather than put Julien at risk, but in doing so she is forced to observe Julien's sad and lonely life without her in it.
A beautiful, intriguing and atmospheric mystery of the netherworld and how with love, nothing is impossible.
No comments:
Post a Comment