ARCHIVES 2019 / Intimacy

A man and a woman make love every Wednesday without talking, but this silence closes in on them like a trap. In a terribly photogenic London, Patrice Chéreau explores the intimacy and opacity of two bodies together. Gorgeous and powerful.

Somewhere in London, in a run down house. A man dresses hurriedly to open the door to a woman. He offers her a cup of instant coffee, they barely say a word to each other. They make love. The following week, on the same day, she stands in front of his door again. This time, they get undressed right away. Who are they? What do they want? How can their relationship go on?

Hand-held camera and cut-up images of the streets and night life; long tracking shots when Jay and Claire make love... Chéreau's admirable work on the image gains in intensity in the very specific setting of the film: London as described by Hanif Kureishi in his film London Kills Me, and in his books and screenplays (My Beautiful Laundrette, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid, The Buddha of Suburbia...), a harsh city in which human relationships are made of both brutality and a certain tenderness.