Hiroshima Mon Amour- a paradox on celluloid

Overwhelmingly passionate, true Resnais style, HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR is the story of a French actress and a Japanese architect interspersed with the place as a background. Hiroshima acts as a solid base for the story, leading to a tale of tragedy, longing and tries to ask a philosophical justification to the bombings that we witnessed in history.



Elle and Lui though happily married with their respective partners, but this chance encounter leads Elle down the memory lane drawing parallels between her first lover and Lui. In the passionate encounter as Elle narrates her story of having seen the bombing, Lui tries his best to nullify her claim.

The film throws many questions like whether it is best to have loved that to not have presented oneself the opportunity of being loved? Whether what one thinks is the reality may be negated to being just a figment of imagination. Based on Marguerite Duras novel, Hiroshima Mon Amour (Hiroshima My love) is a paradoxical journey through Resnais lens.

The Director:

Alain Resnais was born on June 3, 1922 in the town of Vannes, on the western coast of France. His career as a filmmaker began when he made his first amateur film at age 14. He studied his craft at the Institut des Hautes ètudes Cinémato-graphiques in Paris, and began his professional career with a series of short films, many of which focus on art and the life of artists, including Guernica, Gaugin, and Van Gogh, which won him an Academy Award in 1948 at the young age of 26. His documentary Night and Fog is regarded by many as the most important Holocaust film ever made.

Hiroshima, Mon Amour, his first 35mm film, won the Cannes Film Festival International Critics Prize in 1959. His later films include Last Year at Marienbad (1961), Muriel (1963), La Guerre est finie (1966), Stavisky (1974), Providence (1977), Mon oncle d'Amerique (1980), Life Is a Bed of Roses (1983), L'Amour ê Mort (1984), Melo (1986), I Want to Go Home (1989), Smoking and No Smoking (1993).