Je t'aime, je t'aime (1968)

After attempting suicide, Claude is recruited for a time travel experiment, but, when the machine goes haywire, he may be trapped hurtling through his memories.

Director:

Alain Resnais

Writer:

Jacques Sternberg

Stars:

Claude Rich, Olga Georges-Picot, Anouk Ferjac

2 wins.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Claude Rich	...	Claude Ridder
Olga Georges-Picot	...	Catrine
Anouk Ferjac	...	Wiana Lust
Alain MacMoy	...	Le technicien qui vient chercher Ridder
Vania Vilers	...	Le technicien-chauffeur
Ray Verhaeghe	...	Le technicien aux souris
Van Doude	...	Jan Rouffer - le chef du centre de recherches de Crespel
Yves Kerboul	...	Le technicien au tableau noir
Dominique Rozan	...	Le médecin de Crespel / Doctor Haesserts
Annie Bertin	...	Hélène Wirtz - la jeune femme à la trompette
Jean Michaud	...	Le directeur de la maison de diffusion
Claire Duhamel	...	Jane Swolfs
Bernard Fresson	...	Bernard Hannecart
Sylvain Dhomme	...	L'homme qui invite Ridder à dîner
Irène Tunc	...	Marcelle Hannecart

Storyline

Recovering from an attempted suicide, a man is selected to participate in a time travel experiment that has only been tested on mice. A malfunction in the experiment causes the man to experience moments from his past in a random order.

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Plot Keywords:

time travel | claim in title | nonlinear timeline | man and woman in bed | sexuality | 

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Taglines:

Science Fiction? Thriller? Comedy? A Romantic Love Story

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Genres:

Drama | Sci-Fi

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Did You Know?

Quotes

Claude Ridder: Catherine. Catherine... I love you. Do you hear me? I love you. It was the only reason. Long before you die. And now I'm dead. I'm cold. I hear my words. It's the drug... How likely I'll survive? Oh yeah, 100% if I were a rat. Then I'm a rat, because I'm alive. Now see... anyway still have to wait four minutes. And the rat? Where is the rat?

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Soundtracks

Misterioso
by Thelonious Monk

User Reviews

Laboratory rat in the cage of love

Resnais is haunted by time and memory(viz:- Hiroshima Mon Amour,Muriel, Last Year in Marienbad). Je t'aime, je t'aime, is his attempt to revisit a man's memory of his past love who committed suicide, through a sci-fi framework. A group of researchers have built a time machine and have sent as mouse back in time for 1 minute. However they need a human subject, one who having survived suicide, has nothing to lose. He wants to return to a time when he was at his happiest with his beloved, Catrine. Claude ( Claude Rich) becomes hopelessly lost and unstuck in time, as the machine jumps from one memory to another, in the process something goes wrong, and the patient's memories become fragmented, uncoiling in bits and pieces, out of order, sometimes looping back again and again. In the process, we see relationship come together and fall apart, and the tragic nature of what we're watching isn't clear until the final moments. The question is, did Resnais film the memories in the same random order that the novelist, Jacques Sternberg, wrote them? Moment to moment, we're unclear of what we're seeing even when it seems so simple, so plain. As the narrative continues to spin around like a zoetrope, a visit to the beach or a quiet conversation in bed acquires new meanings as the film progresses. It's as much a love story, or a science-fiction story, as it is a story about storytelling itself, and continues on themes which Resnais has treated before. The surreality of each image and scene, lies like shattered glass. We're left to put the pieces back together, tracing the rapturous highs and turbulent lows of his relationship with his girlfriend Catrine (Olga Georges-Picot). Ridder is trapped in an isolated world of his own fractured, infinitely repeating memories.

Resnais captures the seemingly mundane rituals of everyday life-dead time- that define the essence of human existence. Ridder's unremarkable life is presented in terse and abstract episodes that, although also eschewing narrative, inherently illustrate a complexity of form, experience, tactility, and emotional realism. In the end, it is the film's organic ability to convey depth and texturality that elicits pathos and humanity for the deeply flawed, alienated, modern day tragic hero imprisoned by the eternal torment of his inescapable, haunted memories.This is a remarkable film-a link between Marker's La Jetée and Gondry's The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind-which doesn't quite come off, as you can't quite pin-point the moment the lover's drifted apart. A cubist structure is built up from a man's life cut in pieces. It's compelling technically, not emotionally: Claude is a neurotic daydreamer, and can't effect any changes, washed on the tides of fractured memory like a jellyfish.Like the haunting image of the mouse at the end the self is trapped in a glass cage, gasping for air. An astringent artistry is at play behind it all.

Details

Country:

France

Language:

French Dutch English

Release Date:

24 April 1968 (France)

Also Known As:

Te amo, te amo

Filming Locations:

Avenue Jules Malou, Etterbeek, Brussels, Brussels-Capital, Belgium

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$12,869, 16 February 2014

Gross USA:

$71,717

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$80,393

Company Credits

Production Co:

Les Productions Fox Europa, Parc Film

Technical Specs

Runtime:

94 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1