Therese and Isabelle

To be honest (and why wouldn't I be honest?), I wasn't sure which part of my body (penis, heart, or mind, in order of suspicion) would be most frequently stimulated while watching Therese and Isabelle, a lesbian love film from 1968 by Radley Metzger, a director of softcore sex films of an artistic nature. When it began in black and white I was even more curious, because for some reason I'd expected a color film. The other films I'd seen by Metzger, Score and The Image, were in color, but anyway Therese and Isabelle is black and white, and the answer is heart.

So much heart. Therese and Isabelle fits squarely in the tradition of boarding school romance narratives, and explores the meaning and makes subjective the experience of self-discovery that comes from investigation of the interior and/or physical world of another (and instigates all sorts of themes that I cherish).

It was Metzger's use of space and pacing that indicated to me what kind of movie this was going to be. The lead character Therese (Essy Persson) is sent to a new school in part because her mother has remarried some wealthy man whom she (the mother) enjoys making love to and traveling with. Therese isn't invited into their new lives, as she's made painfully aware, and so begins her time at the school questioning her perceptions on love, loyalty, intimacy, and self-identity.

I concede the point that my ~205kb cell phone photos, taken of my television from my couch, don't do justice to the beauty of the camerawork, landscapes, and architecture exhibited in the movie. While sometimes I question the meaning of background beauty in movies, in this one it's clear: why, when everything is so gorgeous, do I (Therese) feel so low?

The blocking sometimes evokes Michelangelo Antonioni, which, if you don't know, is actually not off base. Metzger began his civilian film career by cutting trailers for Janus, including Antonioni and Bergman films. Metzger once said that a compliment from Bergman about one of his trailers was the highlight of his (Metzger's) career (source needed, where did I hear this, did I dream it, am I making it up?). The dvd liner notes make studious mention of Georges Auric's contribution as composer for the film.

None of which matters or is important when the movie is on, because you can enter without cultural or filmic reference points, because the story is told with emotional precision and tonal accuracy. The POV is an adult Therese as she revisits the boarding school and memories of her and Isabelle's love affair are stirred by locations and objects around the grounds and school.

Isabelle (Anna Gaël) isn't the perfect romantic partner, which quality alone elevates the film into a realistic, painful, and imperfect realm. She also isn't Therese's only lover in the film, and the other encounter is poignant and necessary for emotional development, in case you still think this is some standard sex film.

Also, the movie really isn't very sexy. Most of what's explicit is narrated in voice over, and most of the voice over I had trouble finding sexy. This may have been purposeful in some instances, as their relationship is so clearly about more than sex, and their physical encounters are also about more than sex.

It's really about painful encounters with others, and it's really about the inherent instability and insecurity in our relationships with others (for me that's what it was about, maybe it'll say something else to you). Also the excitement, the nervousness, the adventure - all these things mixed up together. For example the above photo, wherein the girls stare at each other naked.

Or this photo, wherein Therese presses her ear against the wall and hears the sounds of others making love in the room next to the one she and Isabelle have rented to make love. You experience with Therese the process of learning about sexual identity, yours and others, and its ultimate value. To Metzger's credit you don't just experience it, you feel it too.