Toute Une Nuit (1982)

bfi, intense yearning, akerman summer 2023

- the night allows for action, impulse, drives, desires (to love, to leave), emotion and indulgence in them.

- the night is full of sound, it permeates every frame and scene, and we often hear the sound of cars, heels clicking against the pavement, drunken laughter, before a person appears.

- the night beckons—so many times we hear a person telling another to ‘come’ or ‘come along’, to follow them into the dark. they usually do.

- Akerman’s framings. the night is vast and limitless, characters emerge from the darkness and disappear into it, momentarily illuminated by lamps, street lights, etc. the ending scene takes place in the morning and the corridors frame the couple in a claustrophobic manner in contrast to the expansiveness darkness allows.

Further reading:

Dominiek Hoens, ‘Nothing Personal, Love: On Toute Une Nuit’

[…] the main question that needs to be addressed is why viewers, as Akerman said in an interview with Cahiers du Cinéma, “divide themselves into two camps: some say it is a very sad film, others find that it gives energy, that it makes you want to go out, that it produces a kind of cocaine effect. When I see it, I feel that too: it makes me want to live strongly [vivre fort].”