This film is a documentary about existing in time, quite literally. Those who were and aren't anymore, those on the cusp of non-being (Jean Rochefort who died shortly after filming the sequences for this film), those who are and those who are beginning to be. The film doesn't try to explain or to analyse, but presents sequence after sequence of brief reflections from its subjects, interspersed with long, slow surveys of their worlds: the matter is approached in a soulful, gentle manner, trying to communicate a general sense of being more than an intellectual abstraction. Sometimes it feels superfluous or cringe: among many moments of harrowing emotion, there are others who feel quite self-indulgent, or heavy-handed with symbolism. And yet, it certainly works, and it's occasionally very powerful (the sequence of the swimmers, Diabolo Menthe, the guy who has catalogued every single incident of his life, the breakdancer). One can only wish it were perhaps longer and broader in scope, but it's totally worth seeing even if slightly short of breath.
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