After last weekend’s Varda-fest, I haven’t really had the time or energy to invest in film, but Friday I decided to have another go at Rivette. Up for review this time around are his two 1976 films (trainspotters may correct me, but I believe both were released in the same year): Noroit and Duelle.

These movies are, of course, mentally backlit for me by Celine and Julie Go Boating (see earlier post). Also, N.B.: I haven’t finished Duelle yet, having succumbed to cinarcolepsy on my first go-round. Nevertheless, it’s obvious that both films are of a kind — their central theme consists of two powerful women at odds with one another (as opposed to C&JGB, where two women befriend each other and become powerful as a result of that friendship. Thus, both Noroit and Duelle are considerably darker, both in visage and vision, than Rivette’s earlier masterpiece.

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I’m still trying to figure out what it is that entrances me so about Rivette’s films. I’m beginning to realize that, more than anything, it’s the implicit sense of magic that runs through them. Here, I would define magic as a delightful supernatural force, and mystery, which also runs rampant through Rivette’s films, as something that allows the magic to happen and is also created by that same magic. Another duality. For instance, looking back at C&JGB, it’s the spell that Julie casts at the beginning that seems to bring about the sudden appearance of Celine, who, through her day job, happens to bring more magic, and more mystery, into the mix, and finally, through further magic buffoonery from Julie, the mystery that was created comes to a close, and yet… the film ends with another level of magic and mystery that is satisfying while leaving us wanting more.

It’s been said by others that C&JGB is a very pro-feminist movie, especially for its time. Two female lead characters with only one supporting male actor in the entire film (Barbet Schroeder) was a rare thing in the early 70s. The film celebrates the fast and intimate friendship between Julie and Celine, which — without messing with the term “empowering” — enables them to experience a wider range of life experiences and ultimately accomplish the metaphorical rescue of their innocence, quite unexpectedly.

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But Noroit is a very different movie, and although a theme of women and power, and duality, opposites, starts to become apparent at this point, this film takes it in a much darker direction than C&JGB. It plays on the dual/duel pun explicitly, as it is on one level a “pirate movie” with a fair amount of duelling throughout. (Duelle also falls prey to the pun, albeit eponymously — dual/duel/elle.) Noroit does not paint nearly as clear of a picture as C&JGB. There’s enough plot for a basic understanding of most of the motives behind the actions, but it felt like too much was left out — particularly, how the story came to the point that it is at when the film opens.

Noroit contains its share of fun and magic too, but the fun is a thrilling/chilling fun, had at the characters’ expense, rather than the celebratory fun of C&JGB.

(More to say about Noroit soon, both in relation to other films especially in relation to Duelle, as soon as I finish watching the latter.)