Chichester Cinema at New Park
In The City of Sylvia
En La Ciudad de Sylvia
CHICHESTER INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
With thanks to Axiom Films for this English Premiere
A nameless young man (Xavier Lafitte) arrives in Strasbourg and spends his days sitting at an outdoor café, sketching the figures of the women around him, patiently waiting for Sylvia (Pilar López de Ayala) to appear. He finally thinks he sees her and gives chase, but it turns out to be someone else. He resumes his quest for his lost love and the innocence he longs to regain.
Sylvia’s presence lingers, but it is impossible to return to the past. Guerín is clearly interested in the artist and his interminable gaze on his subjects. We become the voyeurs, seeing everything through the eyes of the handsome young man. He highlights the beauty in the objects and people he observes: the way the hair falls on the back of someone’s neck; the delicate smile of a person in deep thought; the way the light plays on the creases of a dress.
Guerín’s attention to sound is also one of the highlights of the film. We hear the scribbling of the pencil on the page as the artist sketches, and the click-clack, click-clack of heels as a woman walks past him then out of the camera’s (and our) vision. Dans la ville de Sylvia imparts nostalgia for days when it was plausible to search for love, wander streets aimlessly and immerse oneself in a foreign place: the freedom to do as one pleases.
The pleasure of people-watching is raised to the level of high art in this dreamy, ravishing study of one man's pursuit of lost love, which Variety called 'an airy, ultra-Gallic delight whose apparent weightlessness is anchored by real substance'. A pensive young writer (played by angel-faced Xavier Lafitte) glimpses a woman he once knew, and follows her, desperate to revive their liaison from years before. But does she remember him? Did he really know her at all? And is he really looking for her, or will any beautiful woman do...?
Festooned with gorgeous faces, drenched in melancholy romance, and extraordinarily sophisticated in its visual and narrative style, this is a treat for all of the senses, with echoes of Antonioni & Alan Resnais.
Subtitled
(Tickets £7)
Spain · 
France · 2007 · Jose Luis Guerin · 84min
