Boy Meets Girl

In his debut film, Leos Carax lets a budding filmmaker, who has not yet got beyond thinking up film titles, stagger through Paris at night, shot by cinematographer Jean-Yves Escoffier in black and white that is as surreal as it is precise. Carax lends Denis Lavant, with whom he is working for the first time, his own real first name Alex. Abandoned by his girlfriend and about to start his military service, Alex stumbles lovesick through this highly poetic film, which also tells the story of Mireille (Mireille Perrier), who has also been abandoned and tries to banish her melancholy with tap dancing. As the title suggests, Alex and Mireille will move towards each other, straight into the dark heart of the night. Carax interprets cinema as a cool dream machine and borrows from film history, from Buster Keaton to the Nouvelle Vague. (Andrea Pollach)

Photo: Austrian Film Museum