The Girl

An art student (Agathe de la Boulaye) falls in love with a nightclub singer (Claire Keim), despite the singer’s involvement with a shady and threatening man (Cyril Lecomte). The only thing to be said for this dreary, leaden lesbian film-noir is that the actresses seem to have dutifully memorized their few lines, and that director Sande Zeig never allows us to see the shadow of the camera or the microphone bobbing into the top of the frame. Otherwise, it’s 84 of the longest minutes in movie history. At one point the art student says about her painting, “I find that if I look long enough, if I fumble enough, a form eventually emerges.” This, regrettably, seems to be Zeig’s (and co-writer Monique Wittig’s) approach to moviemaking as well.