ALICE or THE LAST ESCAPADE   1977 (Alice ou la Dernière Fugue) Directed by Claude Chabrol 93 minutes In French with English subtitles.

Perhaps of all of the French New Wave filmmakers, the one I have neglected the most is Claude Chabrol. Alice is one of the strangest, least seen, and most surreal of all Claude Chabrol's films, and it features the Dutch soft-core erotic actress Sylvia Kristel (Emmanuelle) in the lead role of the titular Alice. This is a very visual film, often like a silent journey, which follows Alice into another zone, and it is of course inspired by Lewis Carroll's adventures in Wonderland.

Alice lives with her husband who is a professional businessman. She finds her marriage has become boring as hell, and she decides to break up. She goes for a drive in the countryside, when she encounters a strange mansion. She stays there overnight, and slowly she finds herself caught in parallel worlds. There are many visual, mysterious, dialogue-free sequences as we follow Alice in otherworldly situations, accompanied sometimes by a weirdo electronic music score. In a way, it a monument to actress Sylvia Kristel who is totally charming and somehow charismatic despite the fact that dialogue is kept at a minimum. The film could even be called 'Sylvia Kristel in the Twilight Zone.' Chabrol himself claimed it was inspired by “William Shakespeare and Phillip K. Dick" but modern audiences are more likely to see an influence on David Lynch.

Another outrageously rare screening of a flick that one many feel is among the director's best works.