England,
1990, 75 min
Shown in 1991
CREDITS
- dir
-
Udayan Prasad
- prod
-
Innes Lloyd
- scr
-
Alan Bennett
- cam
-
John Hooper
- editor
-
Ken Pearce
- cast
-
Alan Bates, Janet McTeer, Paul Rhys
- source
-
BBC-TV Centre
- gga award
-
Best of Category, Television: Television Feature
- premiere
-
U.S. Premiere
OTHER
Writer Alan Bennett, whose past work includes the acclaimed series Talking Heads (SFIFF 1989) and the award-winning Prick Up Your Ears (SFIFF 1987), has created a sypathetic and understated script about an episode in the life of Marcel Proust during the First World War. Working throughout each night with the assistance of his ever-faithful housekeeper Celeste, Proust occasionally ventures out into nighttime Paris. One evening he hears a string quartet playing Franck's Quartet in D and, obsessed by the music, persuades the quartet to visit him in the middle of the night to play. His desire for the music increases as it inspires his writing and the process awakens a different kind of desire, a fascination for the young viola player, Massis (Paul Rhys, Vincent and Theo). Although Proust invites the young musician on numerous occasions to play for him, Massis, innocently unaware of the true nature of Proust's feelings, disappears from his life... The script is dense with inflection and nuance rather than action, and the performances of Alan Bates as Proust and Janet McTeer as Celeste match Bennett's achievement.
—Sheila Whitaker
FACTOID #319
The Library of Congress supplied the Festival with the only existing print of Double Indemnity for the Fred MacMurray tribute in 1987. The problem was, the reels were not marked for the projectionist. But the show must go on! The projectionist ordered the reels using his intuition and the gamble paid off—the film was screened in perfect sequence.
