Marked Eyes - 1964

Robert Hossein is a pulp genius and master stylist. He makes more from less than any director I can think of. His simple, evocative camera movements align with his unpredictable, powerful editing to generate suspense, tension, arousal - lotta shockingly hot stuff for the era, as usual in his pictures - compassion and ever-deeper involvement in the story.

This is Hossein's most direct narrative. It seems to be about exactly what plot says it is, which is almost weird, given the multi-layeredness of his other pictures. And it's no less hypnotic for that.

This is also his most Noir Noir. BLONDE IN A WHITE CAR is so weird and singular I'm not sure it's a Noir at all. This features not one but two femmes fatale. The young, seemingly innocent one in her little girl pajamas casually walking around a filthy basement bashing at everything with a razo-sharp hatchet while blithely blackmailing her victim is peak Hossein.

Hossein co-stars with Michéle Morgan, and treats her austere, enigmatic face and balletic grace - wait til you see her glide through the forest in her chic city shoes – as Antonioni treats Monica Vitti: an infinite, glamorous, cinematic mystery.

Hossein's genius is something of a mystery, too. He's a pure cinematician working with the most low-brow, pulp material that he turns into poetry. His father's (!) beautiful, lyrical score works in exact opposition to the grit of the story, thus raising even more contradictory emotions.