Review of SCÉNARIO DU FILM “PASSION” (1982)

From Letterboxd (December 4, 2017). In the past six months, I’ve managed to find streaming options (read: FilmStruck) or downloaded copies for all the films listed below. The most recent discovery has been the addition of seven Straub-Huillet films on FilmStruck, though most of their filmography still remains unavailable.

Let me preface w a rant: How in God’s name in this day + age is one supposed to see the neglected works of cinema, esp those produced by the masters of the medium? To this day, I still cannot find Straub-Huillet, Duras (minus The Lorry), plenty of Godard, Distant Voices, Still Lives (aside from a low-quality bootleg online), and dozens of others… Help me, Letterboxd!

This 54-minute video featurette started out as one of these cases. Eventually I found a 240p, non-subtitled bootleg on some random streaming site from fucking Georgia (the country), but I couldn’t for the life of me find a single transcript or subtitle file. As a result I ended up understanding only about 25% of what Godard was saying (I had to read pull quotes from the available criticism to fill in about 25% more) so who knows how good or bad Scénario really is?

I’m half-joking, of course, because despite the language barrier, the message is clear: Scénario is another variation on the same themes announced in Passion, another invocation…