In this emotionally complex romantic drama from master director Alain Resnais (Last Year at Marienbad), a love story blossoms between two wounded souls in the aftermath of World War Two.
Emanuelle Riva plays Elle, a French actress grieving her late partner, who was a German soldier, as she arrives in Japan to star in an anti-war film. She falls for Japanese architet Lui (Eiji Okada), who similarly mourns the loss of his own family – victims of the devestating, historically momentous atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima.
A classic of the French New Wave, this affecting, gorgeously photographed romance boasts a remarkable, Oscar-nominated screenplay from esteemed writer-director Marguerite Duras (India Song), and pioneered the use of quick-cut flashbacks as a means of skilfully grappling with memory.
Exploring the border-crossing legacy of the Second World War and the seismic impact of the attack on Hiroshima for those left behind, Resnais’ film is one of cinema’s great evocations of how the past intrudes upon the present.