Alphaville

The futuristic Now, "terrifying because irreversible." Tour of the technocracy by Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine), secret agent, bogus Figaro-Pravda reporter, shutterbug, his Ford Galaxie is his spaceship. Search for Professor Von Braun, née Professor Nosferatu (Howard Vernon), inventor of the death ray and father of the "jolie sphinx" (Anna Karina). A glassy, fluorescent New World Order, or simply Paris at night shot on the fly by Raoul Coutard with harsh light bulbs. Alpha 60 the computer overlord, an air conditioner fan croaking out electronic epigrams about humanity's end: "I am merely the logical means of this destruction." Jean-Luc Godard's Metropolis, also his Kiss Me Deadly and Mr. Arkadin, the lyricism of science sought and found. A city of serpentine corridors, the reptilian gumshoe and "veteran of Guadalcanal" stomps through them, bemused by the slot machine that begs a coin and spits out a thank-you note. Divided zones, bleeping signs filling the screen. "This isn't a Bible, it's a dictionary!" Gathering at the swimming pool (cf. Fuller's Underworld U.S.A.) for executions, a new take on walking the plank to great applause. The irrationality of love is to be treasured, a moving aria by Akim Tamiroff while clutching a fembot in a fleapit. Éluard, Dick Tracy, Chandler, Flash Gordon, Heckle and Jeckle out of Kafka. Cocteau's Orphée is a fountain of inspiration, Murnau's shadow falls on lobby elevators and switches to negative stock. "I refuse to become what you refer to as normal." The true sci-fi adventure unfolds in hotel rooms, where the bullfrog helps the princess discover such lost words as "conscience" and "love." (Roeg includes a vivid memory of it in The Man Who Fell to Earth.) Short-circuiting minds, short-circuiting cinema, altogether dazzling. "Savez-vous ce qui transforme la nuit en lumière?" "La poésie." Truffaut gets a dialogue going with Fahrenheit 451. With László Szabó, Michel Delahaye, Christa Lang, and Jean-Pierre Léaud. In black and white.