Melodrama has not always had a negative or ironic connotation. In fact, in the 19th century this theatrical genre was closer to what the etymology of the word indicates, that is, a drama (usually set in a family environment) with music. Alain Resnais, the French director whose name is associated with the New Wave, although his films are very different from those of other famous directors of the movement, knew the art of theater well and explored the links between theater and film in the last decades of his life and career. ‘Mélo‘, his 1986 film is a melo-drama in the classic sense of the term and even more than that, since the heroes of the film are musicians and music plays an important role in the story. It is a very faithful adaptation of a 1929 play by Henri Bernstein, an almost forgotten playwright today, an interesting and picturesque character. Resnais‘s bet seems to have been to give life, with a combination of cinematographic and theatrical means, to a text that was not a literary masterpiece to start with, to which he nevertheless remained faithful. The dialogues from the play are preserved, only shortened and edited by Resnais. It is, actually one of the few films in which he intervened as a screenwriter, but without being credited for it. It can be said that Alain Resnais almost completely won the bet.
‘Mélo‘ is modeled as a filmed play. The credits look like a hall program and the sets are ostentatiously theatrical. We even have the raising and lowering of curtains that mark the three parts of the film (or three acts of the play, if you like). Pierre and Marcel are violinists and friends. In the first act, Marcel is invited to dinner by Pierre and his young wife, Romaine. While Marcel describes his love affairs, Romaine seems to fall under his spell. The next day she will visit him under the pretext of a musical audition that will mark the beginning of a relationship between the two. The story becomes complicated when Pierre falls ill, and his illness is possibly not unrelated to Romaine’s potion treatments. Just when the plot had taken a turn reminiscent of Hitchcock’s films, something unexpected happens. The integrity of the love triangle is in danger, and Romaine’s passion for one or the other of the two men ends up competing with their friendship.
Alain Resnais‘ films have often been appreciated for their cinematic qualities and technical inventiveness, but criticized for their apparent lack of emotion. Cinematographically, ‘Mélo‘ is interesting precisely for its theatricality, amplified by the image and the music. André Dussollier, the actor undertaking the role of Marcel, has a monologue of about six minutes in which he reveals all the hidden corners of his character, but I think that even if we had the best places at a theater performance, we would not be able to perceive all the acting nuances as in the close-up frame created by the director and his cinematographer. The confined spaces of the emphatically theatrical sets are expanded by games of mirrors. Two violin sonatas (one by Bach and the other by Brahms) will play important roles in the plot, but in this melo-drama, music is talked about more than music is performed or listened to. In addition to Dussollier, Pierre Arditi and Sabine Azéma appear in the other two roles of the love triangle, and Fanny Ardant in a supporting role. They all make up a small team of faithful actors who accompanied Resnais in his films of that period. They all know each other very well and interact wonderfully. It is from here, from within, that emotion erupts, and this minimalist and stylish film manages not only to rehabilitate theater in film but also to convey a message about friendship being stronger than passion.