The Immortal

You are in Istanbul, you are a foreigner, you are lost. An unchanging sequence of frames unfolds with each new return to them, erasing the distinction between event and memory. The sense of reality fades away, becoming strange and unsettling — a split begins. The hero is no longer sure whether what is happening is real or a dream. Is the girl’s name Lali? Is it a mosque or a maritime museum? Did he really see a tulip on the Turkish carpet? Does he have a maid? When needed, she is absent. Who is that fisherman on the steps leading to the sea? There is no fisherman here. Where is the address written by the girl on the piece of paper abandoned in the grass? What address?

This is the first directorial work of French avant-garde novelist Alain Robbe-Grillet, filmed shortly after the release of Alain Resnais' revolutionary film "Last Year at Marienbad," for which Robbe-Grillet wrote the screenplay.

Louis Delluc Prize and nomination for the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival