Train of Shadows

Though slow, determinedly poetic, and in places rather abstract, this casts a spell. It begins with home movies shot at the family chateau in the '30s by Parisian lawyer Gérard Fleury, who disappeared mysteriously while off looking for a special quality of light. The film then visits the now empty Normandy chateau, the images suggesting the presence of ghosts. Finally, the archive footage is returned to, though this time treated, reversed and repeated, and new suggestions of relationships between the people begin to emerge. It's a strange exercise, haunting, even at times erotic (writer/director Guerin seems - quite understandably - obsessed by Fleury's stunningly beautiful daughter).