Last Night at Marienbad

Last night, or was it last year, at the theatre where I saw Last Year at Marienbad, they were—truly—selling a “pocket edition of 192 ‘Marienbad’ games” for $1.00 in the lobby. The item was, frankly, not without a certain fascination for me, but, as I advanced on the concession after seeing the movie, I suddenly broke out into a sweat at the thought of what I might discover, and fled the premises instead. Yet, even as I ran, I had to admit to the perfect reasonableness of the thing. Indeed, why not a do-it-yourself Marienbad kit, including a Marienbad hat among other things? Certainly, I had neither the right nor desire to deny such to others, even though nothing I had just seen had made me wish to change my recently acquired La Notte hat (and Viridiana suit), the first articles I had found really to fit me since my L’Avventura-Breathless ensemble-already, I’m afraid, beginning to look a bit démodé. Yet I’d hardly wish to make my style into someone else’s uniform. So why not?

The games did not simply happen to be in the lobby last night. At the conclusion of the film, they were advertised, on screen, via a trailer, which also announced the availability of the scenario in book form, introduced by its author, and a special issue of the New York Film Bulletin devoted to the film. The issue included the film-makers’ statements of their intentions, and the trailer added of these: “It may help.” This is interesting; the thoroughness of the merchandising points unmistakably to the fact that there is now a small Marienbad industry in existence, only in part directed toward the usual campaign to get you inside the theatre. Its main concern is explaining what has happened to you inside the theatre once you have left. Although this explaining starts even before you see the film. Last night, at the theatre where I saw Last Year at Marienbad, the movie was also preceded by a filmed announcement, this explaining that what you were about to see, despite the fact you might think you didn’t understand it, was, nonetheless, in- disputably great. Like Ring Lardner: “Shut up,” he explained.