Combat d’amour en songe (2000)

Combat d’amour en songe is a French fantasy film first released in 2000, directed by Raoul Ruiz.  The film stars Melvil Poupaud, Elsa Zylberstein, Lambert Wilson, Christian Vadim and Diogo Dória.  It has also been released under the title: Love Torn in Dream.  Our overall rating for this film is: mediocre.


Nine bizarre stories are interwoven as a visual fantasy.  A jewel is stolen from a "living" painting; a mirror has the power to steal whatever it reflects; a young man’s future is foreseen by an internet website; a seminary student dresses up as a priest so that he can listen to confessions; a Catholic man discovers that he is really a Jew; brothers fight as they search for some rings; and a treasure hunt leads to...

After his haunting dream-like adaptation of Marcel Proust – Le Temps retrouvé (1999) – Raoul Ruiz’s Combat d’amour en songe is an even more baffling, free-flowing work in which the conventional linear narrative format is all but totally dispensed with.  Experimental and slightly off-putting, this is possibly Ruiz’s least accessible, most self-indulgent work to date.

© James Travers 2006

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