Directed by Alain Resnais

The grass bursting through the constricting tarmac in the opening shots stands as an image of a film of the self same qualities: crazy, anarchic, deluded, or just plain foolish, but somehow admirable for its chutzpah. Resnais, at 88, who tends to be remembered for the icy precisions of Last Year in Marienbad, the dour introspection of Muriel, and chilling film about the holocaust, Night and Fog, here shows a breezy joy which does a great deal to redeem the film as it limps, plods, but at times dances along its absurdist narrative. Not Muriel on acid, exactly, but certainly high-dose caffeine.

It all begins when Georges (Andre Dussollier) picks up Marguerite's (Sabine Azema) purse when it's dropped by a thief, sees her photograph and (thrilling!) pilot's licence inside, and develops a rather tedious obsession for her. He's allegedly fiftyish (though the actor is actually in his 60s); Marguerite, a dentist, who brings memories of Katherine Helmond, for those of you who remember Soap, is slightly younger (though not as young as his impossibly young-looking wife and mother of his grown up children), but a game gal with her wild permed hair and flying habit (and bunion-plagued feet). So we seem to be set on a screwball autumnal romance showing that when it comes to amour fou there's no age limit. Or maybe no fou like an old fou. Unfortunately Georges' unrequited version soon becomes a mite tedious, though it's enlivened by the injection of Mathieu Amalric enjoying himself hugely as a hyperactive policeman, and the ever watchable, rather forbidding Emmanuelle Davos as Marguerite's partner in dentistry - and that's a practice you certainly wouldn't want to be a patient at.

The colours and the movement of the first section - the yellow bag flying through the air, the frizzy red hair, the glossy shoes, the scarlet purse - promise much. Resnais certainly still knows his way into an audience's (well, mine anyway) sensual pleasure zones. And the odd Bunuellian touch whets the appetite. But as surrealism, as romance, as high comedy, it's all a bit half-cock, and it doesn't say anything remarkable about relationships, or ageing, or anything, really. But then it probably doesn't intend to. There are enough mildly funny or charming or just plain beautiful moments to make watching an enjoyable experience, and nice to see a master effortlessly at work. If you can't make a daft film at 88,what a dull world it would be.

Seen at Tyneside Cinema, 13 July 2010