Aicard

Total Eclipse (1995)

Actors: Andrzej Seweryn (actor), Patrick Boshart (miscellaneous crew), David Thewlis (actor), Fabien Pondevaux (miscellaneous crew), Christopher Hampton (actor), Victor Glynn (miscellaneous crew), Agnieszka Holland (director), Leonardo DiCaprio (actor), Jan A.P. Kaczmarek (composer), Christopher Hampton (writer), Dominique Blanc (actress), Romane Bohringer (actress), Christopher Thompson (actor), Pierre-Yves Gayraud (costume designer), Elly Verduyckt (miscellaneous crew),

Plot: In 1871, Paul Verlaine (1844-1896), an established poet, invites boy genius Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891) to live with Paul and his young pregnant wife, Mathiltde, in her father's home in Paris. Rimbaud's uncouth behavior disrupts the household as well as the insular society of French poets, but Verlaine finds the youth invigorating. Stewed in absinthe and resentment, Verlaine abuses Mathiltde; he and Rimbaud become lovers and abandon her. There are reconciliations and partings with Mathiltde and partings and reconciliations with Rimbaud, until an 1873 incident with a pistol sends one of them to prison. Codas dramatize the poets' final meeting and last illnesses.

Keywords: 1870s, 19th-century, absinthe, abyssinia, adultery, africa, age-difference, amputation, anal-sex, apology
Genres: Biography, Drama, Romance,
Taglines: Touched by Genius. Cursed by Madness. Blinded by Love. Impassioned by genius. Inflamed by desire. Imprisoned by love.

Quotes:

Arthur Rimbaud: I have no intention of taking a job. My work is going far too well - I can't afford to waste time earning money.

Arthur Rimbaud: The only unbearable thing is that nothing is unbearable.

Arthur Rimbaud: Do you love me?::Paul Verlaine: What?::Arthur Rimbaud: Do you love me?::Paul Verlaine: Yes...::Arthur Rimbaud: Then put your hand on the table.::Paul Verlaine: What?::Arthur Rimbaud: Put your hand on the table.

Arthur Rimbaud: Let the 98 wounds of our savior burst and bleed.

Arthur Rimbaud: Love has to be reinvented.

Paul Verlaine: You don't care about my happiness, do you?::Arthur Rimbaud: No, neither should you.

[first lines]::Paul Verlaine: Sometimes he speaks in a kind of tender dialect of the death which causes repentence, of the unhappy men who certainly exist, of painful tasks and heartrending departures. In the hovels where we got drunk he wept looking at those who surrounded us, the cattle of poverty. He lifted up drunks in the black streets. He had the pity a bad mother has for small children. He moved with the grace of a little girl at catechism. He pretended to know about everything, business, art, medicine. I followed him, I had to!

[last lines]::Arthur Rimbaud: I've found it.::Paul Verlaine: What?::Arthur Rimbaud: Eternity. It's the sun mingled with the sea.

Arthur Rimbaud: [to Verlaine] We should make a bargain. You help me... and I'll help you. If we go away together, I'm sure you'll be able to start doing good work again. And when we've taken as much as we can from each other... [Moves closer to Verlaine] We simply split up and move on.::Paul Verlaine: And how would we live?::Arthur Rimbaud: Well, you have some money, don't you? [Chuckles]::Paul Verlaine: I understand. I help you by supporting you... [Between a laugh] And you help me by renewing my rusty, old inspiration. Is that it?::Arthur Rimbaud: [Smiles, puts his hand to Verlaine's face and strokes it] You hold it all together. [He moves toward his mentor and kisses him. Verlaine looks at him in shock, but the young teenage poet only smiles. Paul leans to him and they kiss passionately]