GREEN ROOM, THE

Truffaut directs and stars in this personal film set in the 1920s as a quiet man working for a provincial magazine where he specializes in writing obituaries. Haunted by the death of his young wife, Truffaut is the lost lover obsessed with his memories, and in jeopardy of losing the opportunity for life and happiness with a beautiful woman (sympathetically played by Nathalie Baye) who offers him his last chance to choose between life and death. Truffaut's ambition to create meaningful, compassionate yet entertaining films are successfully fulfilled in this intense drama. He has set out to tell a “love story involving only one character,” and through his own underplayed acting and the outstanding cinematography of Nestor Almendros (1978's “Days of Heaven”), he has created perhaps his most important film. Many of Truffaut's films are familiar to Clevelanders including the recent releases “Day for Night” (1973), “The Man Who Loved Women” (1977) and last year's festival selection “Love on the Run” (1979). “An elegant and beautiful requiem.” – American Film Institute