Vocês Ainda Não Viram Nada!

Even at the very end of his career, (he was going on 90 at the time), Alain Resnais remained one of cinema's most original and innovative directors, choosing to introduce the cast of his penulitmate film "You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet", not as 'characters' but as themselves so the people seen answering their telephones are Michel Piccoli, Lambert Wilson, Sabine Azema and so on, who will continue in the film both as themselves and as characters in a production of "Eurydice" by Jean Anouilh as they watch it being performed by the Compagnie de la Colombe while stepping in and out of roles they once made famous.

What follows is a film within a film or maybe just a play within a film, (rather than simply a filmed play), performed by Resnais' stock company in a style straight out of Agatha Christie. It's like a documentary being played out as fiction and, of course, it's an exercise in great acting. Indeed, if anything, this is Resnais' comment on what constitutes 'acting'. As Resnais' stock company interact with the players of the Compagnie de la Colombe we have to ask are they performing 'roles' or simply being themselves?

Of course, the film itself is a tour-de-force by one of the giants of cinema who isn't afraid to strip everything away, (sets and all if necessary), to get to the core of his material while bowling us over with his technical virtuosity at the same time. I know the term 'masterpiece' is used much too often in the cinema but this really is a masterpiece and is shamefully neglected in the Resnais canon.