The Girl

Leave it to the French to come up with this erotically charged but intellectually shaped contribution to lesbian noir. A trail of cigarette smoke snaking through the film's opening credits instantly clues us in to the noir trappings that encase the movie. It's an old chestnut about desire and love obsessed, but one that's based on a story by the legendary lesbian theorist and writer Monique Wittig. And though the film is French-made, the dialogue is entirely in English. Plot and character development are scarce; the film is more an abstraction than an absorption. But the sex is hot and lovely to watch. The characters do not even possess names. The movie begins as we're introduced to a butch woman we come only to know as the Painter (de la Boulaye). Her voiceover narration (another holdover from classic film noir) guides us through the movie. She has become obsessed with a beautiful nightclub singer of moderate talent identified solely as the Girl (Keim). The Girl takes the Painter home for a one-night stand. Soon it becomes clear that the Girl has attachments to one of the nightclub denizens known as the Man (Lecomte), and that these attachments are defined by financial as well as economic terms. The Painter also has a loving sexual and working relationship with an understanding woman named Bu Savé, who says they've experienced these outside attractions before -- and will again. During the time the Painter is not with the Girl or Bu Savé, she tries to paint, although she seems unhappy with most of what she produces. “Start with the abstract, look at it long enough, and a form will develop,” are the types of commentary she provides in her voiceovers. She also spends lots of hours walking the streets and waterfront. The film is shot in such a way that the streets have a timeless French feel, ahistorical and nonspecific. The Painter also wears the same suit (except for when she's wearing nothing) throughout the course of the movie, lending her an even greater archetypal weight. But, even so, The Girl is ultimately a weightless thing, practically erasing itself with all its abstractions and theory. The actresses perform commendably, but this film by first-time director Sande Zeig (who also is president of Artistic License, the distribution company releasing the film) is a misfire. It's understandable what producer Dolly Hall -- who has been in the forefront of the recent wave of lesbian cinema, with such films as High Art, All Over Me, and The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love to her credit -- saw in the outline of The Girl. The problem is that the outline never emerges into a flesh-and-blood movie.