Parisian-based Chilean émigré Raoul Ruiz has turned his hand to a vast range of genres and fantasies, starting with telenovellas in the 60s, he has gone on to craft intelligent and, on occasion, mind-bending discourses on the nature of art, such as in L'hypothese du tableau volé (1978).
Trois vies et une seule mort has four episodes, each with a central character played by Marcello Mastroianni. In each one the character is suffering from a multiple personality disorder.
In the first, Mastroianni leaves his house and his wife (Marisa Paredes) for a short trip, but fails to return. For 20 years he lives in the apartment opposite in the company of sprites and, at the end of this introductory segment, persuades his wife's new husband (Feodor Atkine) to visit him.
In the second, Mastroianni becomes a revered professor of 'negative anthropology' at the Sorbonne. He gives up his job and becomes a beggar, falling in love with a wacky hooker, Tania, played by Anna Galiena. She is a 'maitresse' in Pigalle, and turns out to be a top corporate executive.
In the third, a penniless but chain-fucking young couple inherit a lovely mansion and an endowment. There is just one catch: they cannot get rid of the mansion's decrepit butler (Mastroianni). The young lovers gradually realise that the majordomo of the mansion is in fact its owner and their benefactor.
Ruiz's last episode knots together the others. An extended play on the name of Carlos Castaneda, it has Mastroianni as a powerful businessman, Luc Allemand, who invents a family. His worst nightmare comes true when these fictional relations start turning up on his doorstep.
'The films of Mastroianni that I like most are those he made with Ettore Scola, where he had room to invent things,' says the director. 'In the films with Fellini, he is great but more conditioned by the general structure of the films.'
Pitched midway between 'nightmare and comedy', according to Ruiz, many of the storylines of Trois vies et une seule mort may ring some bells. But that, for Ruiz, was the idea: 'They're stories that everybody knows but no one believes. Three tales which are in fact one, because the three men form one person, who is affected by the so-called 'multiple personality syndrome'. He has three lives, but, like everyone, just one death… I've just tried to make a 'cubist' structure of them.'
Prod co: Gemini Films
Prod: Paolo Branco
Dir: Raoul Ruiz
Guión (Scr): Raoul Ruiz, Pascal Bonitzer
Foto (Ph): Laurent Machuel.
Music: Jorge Arriagada
Mont (Ed): Rodolfo Wedeles
Cast: Anna Galiena, Melvil Poupaud, Chiara Mastroianni, Arielle Dombasle.
Duración (Running time): 123mins
Ventas (Int sales): Gemini Films
Duración (Screening): 24.00, 25 Sept, Principal; 16.30, 26 Sept, Principal; 22.45, 26 Sept, Astoria, 3; 23.00, 27 Sept, Principe, 4
[Home ] [Content ] [The Sponsors ] [The Team ] [Comments ] [Help ]
