Girl Reading a Letter by an Open Window

Girl Reading a Letter by an Open Window

1983 · 46 min · ★ 5.5 · Documentary

Jean-Claude Rousseau's Jeune femme à sa fenêtre lisant une lettre is not only his first medium-length film, but a chance to discover this filmmaker whom Jean-Marie Straub has called, along with Frans Van de Staak and Peter Nestler, the greatest working in Europe. With this newly restored print there is also a possibility to discover the relationship between Rousseau's art of filming and Jan Vermeer's famous painting. As Prosper Hillairet wrote in 1988, four years after Rousseau had finished Jeune femme ... (for the first time as we know today): «Without adopting the usual systematic spirit and form of cinéma structurel, Rousseau presents us with simple images and leaves it at that. Keeps the image in hand. A minimalist and ascetic expression of cinema: a shot that lasts.»

Directed by Jean-Claude Rousseau

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Cast

Jean-Claude Rousseau Himself

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2h 31m together

Girl Reading a Letter by an Open Window

The Antiquities of Rome

Both from Jean-Claude Rousseau.

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In Memoriam

In Memoriam · 2019

MovieDocumentary

A hotel room and a few sweets, their wrappers stacked like gold leaf... An interview with Chantal Akerman and ongoing coverage of the 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, and what emerges is a genuine tragedy, as simple as Racine's.

The Antiquities of Rome

The Antiquities of Rome · 1989

The Antiquities of Rome

MovieDocumentary

A structuralist work composed of static, long-duration shots of Roman ruins and architectural details, all filmed on Super 8. The film operates without a traditional narrative or dialogue, relying on fixed compositions to document the interplay of light and shadow across ancient stone. By framing monuments through windows and doorways, Jean-Claude Rousseau explores the relationship between historical space and the act of observation.

The Enclosed Valley

The Enclosed Valley · 1995

The Enclosed Valley

MovieDocumentary

My films are like that: in a room, but looking out onto an open sky. [...] I can’t really say it except to repeat that Bresson note, ‘that without a thing changing, everything is different.’ The film exists. The fiction is set up, and we believe in it. The justness of the agreement leads us to believe it, because everything plays equally at being a sign. That’s the arrangement of the elements. It’s an act of faith. La vallée close is just this: elements treated above all as if in a documentary that, without being changed, portray the story and reveal between them the elements of fiction. But above all seen as they are, insignificant. And then in the relations they set up, they can satisfy our desire for a story. -- Rousseau

Saudade

Saudade · 2012

“My eyes are imprisoned/ Weeping with great longing”. Soèdade (saudade) — “longing” or “yearning” — is a Portuguese word that does not have a precise translation in English. It has been described as a “…vague and constant desire for something that does not and probably cannot exist…”

Série noire

Série noire · 2009

The title is playing with us, claiming that the film is a detective story. Witch in a way it is not untrue. The camera is peeping tom and it does not lose a thing (almost) in its surveillance: every movement, people coming and going, sounds, a sudden shot... A crime ? Maybe. Some phone calls and nobody answering: another crime ?

Remembering Wavelengths

Remembering Wavelengths · 2014

Remembering Wavelengths

Jean-Claude Rousseau homage to Michael Snow’s film Wavelength.

Starless Night

Starless Night · 2006

Can you tell if yours is a colour or black and white dream ? If yours is a silent or sound dream ? If ther’s a voice off or actual sound ?

Eaux profondes

Eaux profondes · 2012

The loneliness of the white fish in the goldfishes’ aquarium.

Senza mostra

Senza mostra · 2011

MovieDocumentary

Where may the reds and goldens be? Where may the so promised city be? The lover beholds his fate in a faded Venice.

De son Appartement

De son Appartement · 2007

De son Appartement

MovieDocumentary

The continuing demand for high standards is what sets Rousseau's work apart. What makes this film distinctive is the way Rousseau explicitly returns to the source of his creative inspiration. So here he is at home reciting «Bérénice» to himself, whilst going about his household chores. It verges on the comical: There are repeated shots of him obstinately trying to turn off a dripping tap, or the jubilant close up of bare feet carried away in performing a dance step or two. Combining art with life in such a way, that nothing is compartmentalised, nothing lost - that is the goal.

Requiem

Requiem · 2025

MovieDocumentary

As the orchestra choir settles into the church choir, the trombonist blows into his instrument as a warm-up. Mozart's name appears at the top of the score to be performed, whose title is also that of the film: Requiem.

A Day

Europa 2005 – 27 octobre

Europa 2005 – 27 octobre · 2006

Europa 2005 – 27 octobre

MovieDocumentary

Inspired by Rossellini's Europa '51 Straub-Huillet made a film consisting of two pans of a street corner in Paris.

Festival

Festival · 2010

Jean-Claude Rousseau is a filmmaker who believes in the natural power of images. The rigid compositions create something like a pure state, which constantly changes during the period of its viewing – like an empty and simultaneously detail-packed field. During this period the viewer is challenged to find and occupy his own position, to find his perspective in a similar way the filmmaker has found his in several places. Festival combines places the artist has visited during the last few years. Jean-Claude Rousseau’s films not only make beautiful discoveries, they are beautiful discoveries.

La Villa

La Villa · 2017

Passion

Passion · 2015

MovieDocumentary

At first glance, Jean-Claude Rousseau’s films seem like quickly outlined sketches. They are snapshots of various situations and locations, as in this program of nine miniatures, shot in hotel rooms and parks, at the shore of a lake, and – in the longest contribution – on a restaurant terrace. Rousseau’s observations of everyday life, however, are about precision rather than contemplation. With each minute that passes, they sharpen the view of the observant and expectant outsider for a moment of surprise – be it a jump into the water or a huge crucifix.

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