Possession (Andrzej Żuławski, 1981)
i went into this only really knowing about Adjani's incredible and intense performance; i didn't even realize Sam Neill was in it until it showed up in the Brattle's retrospective. in any other film his is the performance that would be lauded for its intensity, but it's a testament to Adjani's skills that she has completely eclipsed him in the popular imagination.
so this film. what the fuck! at no point could i have predicted what would happen next, partly due to the fractured continuity, where it's never clear if you're going into a flashback or simply a hard cut to another scene (sometimes it's both), partly due to the dizzying and disorienting camera-work, and partly due to the characters always doing the most extreme thing they could in a given circumstance.
for all that, it has a surprisingly straightforward plot, even if it's only revealed in the last fifteen minutes or so.
the visual restoration was gorgeous, but unfortunately the audio was pretty muddy, i have no idea if the theater's sound system was acting up or if it was supposed to be like this or if my auditory processing issues were worse than usual, but i feel like i only managed to pick up maybe half or two thirds of the dialogue. but the visual storytelling is so strong that that hardly mattered. still, i'd definitely like to watch it again with subtitles sometime.
4/5 stars