Die Dinge des Lebens

In the organizer's words:

The things of life
FR / IT 1970 | 85 min. | OVR | D: Claude Sautet with Michel Piccoli, Romy Schneider, Lea Massari

Film series Latent Messages of Cinema, curated by Wolfgang M. Schmitt as part of Latent Space. Latent Spaces of Art, 14.11.2025 - 31.01.2026. A project of the Filmwerkstatt Düsseldorf.

A traffic accident opens Claude Sautet's romantic drama The Things of Life: the architect, played by Michel Piccoli, is seriously injured. Flashbacks explain what happened. A man stands between two women (played by Romy Schneider and Lea Massari). They all have something to say to each other, but the messages are delayed. However, latency does not simply mean "too late", but the delay opens up a space of possibility in which there may even be happiness, or at least something like peace. (Wolfgang M. Schmitt)

Latent messages of the cinema

Latency in film is the hesitation before the answer, the pausing of the gaze. The selected films all convey latent messages. Latency turns the cinema into a space of waiting, in which meaning does not appear immediately, but arrives belatedly, but possibly at the right time. In this delay, time becomes tangible - as tension, as promise, as a game with the invisible. Spaces of possibility open up for the audience's projections and fantasies. (Wolfgang M. Schmitt)