La Femme du bout du monde

LA FEMME DU BOUT DU MONDE, Jean Epstein’s final feature, transports viewers to a remote island at the edge of imagination and represents a late-stage culmination of the director’s standard preoccupations. A cargo ship called the Saint-Joachim is in obsessive pursuit of elusive mineral deposits and lands on a desolate island where the explorers discover a mysterious, solitary woman, her deranged husband and their young child at an isolated inn. The outsiders succumb to her enigmatic, magnetic presence; unspoken tensions mount as passion, rivalry and desperation threaten to destroy this confined world. The arrival of a second cargo ship, the Pretoria from England, only complicates matters, and the two crews find themselves at war with each other. Reminiscent of his masterpiece FINIS TERRAE (1928), LA FEMME DU BOUT DU MONDE, shot on location on the island of Ushant off Brittany, marries the stark, rugged beauty of Atlantic exteriors with poetic introspection—the untamed, wild sea becomes both a backdrop and a metaphor for wild, untamed passions that can only lead to tragedy.  (Jean-Michel Gentile)

All retrospective films that will be shown at the Filmmuseum after the Viennale - from 29.10. - can of course also be reserved as usual at filmmuseum.at or by calling 01/533 70 54 and purchased at the box office of the Austrian Film Museum. The prices of the Austrian Film Museum apply.