All language subtitles for The Lover1992 4k

Very early in my life it was too late.

At eighteen, it was already too late.
At eighteen, I aged.

This aging was brutal.

This aging I saw it spread
over my features one by one.

Instead of being frightened by it
I saw this aging of my face

with the same sort of interest
I might have taken for example

in the reading of a book.

That new face, I kept it.

It's kept the same contours
but its matter is destroyed.

I have a destroyed face.

Let me tell you again:
I'm fifteen and a half.

It's the crossing of a ferry
on the Mekong.

Look at me.
I'm fifteen and a half.

It's the crossing of the river.
When I go back to Saigon,

it's as though I'm on a journey,
especially when I take the bus.

That day, it's the end of the school
holidays. I don't remember which one.

I went to spend it in Sadec,
with my two brothers,

in my mother's tied-house,
behind the bush school.

In the horror of the Sadec house.

The big pieces are mine.

Why yours?
- Because that's the way it is.

I wish you'd die.

Paul?

Paulo?

Paul come to bed.
You mustn't be afraid anymore,

nor of Pierre, nor of anything.

Never again, you hear, never again.

He came back?

He's here, on the balcony.
He's sleeping on the mat outside.

He doesn't want to go to his room.
He's too scared of Pierre.

Me, it's when he's outside
that I'm afraid.

I'm afraid he'll leave like that.
That he'll get lost.

It can happen with that kind of child.

That's not true.
You're not afraid for Paul.

You're only afraid for Pierre.

Why is it that you love him so much
and not us, never.

I love all three of my children the same.
- That's not true, it's not true.

Answer, why is it
that you love him so much and not us?

I don't know why.

Yesterday, I wrote to Saigon

to ask for Pierre's repatriation.
- What!

I'm sending him back to France.
You're happy?

He stole at the opium den again.

I can't pay any longer.
It's over.

It's not possible anymore.

Mum, hurry up or I'll miss the bus.

Bye, Paulo.

Take care.
- Yes, Mom.

When are you coming back?
- For Mardi Gras, I already told you.

Oh, I forgot.

So, that day,
I'm going back to Saigon.

I'm wearing my cabaret shoes
and my man's hat.

No woman, no young girl
wears a man's fedora

in that colony in those days.
No native woman either. That hat.

I never leave it. I have that, this hat,
that all by itself makes me whole.

I'm never without it.

So, it's the crossing
of one of the branches of the Mekong,

on the ferry
that's between Vinh Long and Sadec

in the great plains of mud and rice
of southern Indochina,

the plain of the Birds.

Excuse me Mademoiselle, do you smoke?

No, thank you.

I'm sorry, it's so surprising,

a young white girl on a native bus.

I like your hat. It's original.

A man's hat on a young girl.

And you're pretty,
you can do anything you like.

You're who?

I live in Vinh Long.
- Where in Vinh Long?

On the river, just outside.
The big house with the terraces.

The blue-stone one?
- Yes.

It's a Chinese house.
- I am Chinese.

Chinese. He is from that
financial minority that owns

all the popular housing of the colony.

He is back from Paris
where he undertook some business studies.

He is the one who was crossing the Mekong
that day towards Saigon.

If you want, I can drive you to Saigon.

Do you know her?
She's the Administrator's wife,

Mrs Stretter. Anne-Marie.

Do you want one?
- Yes, thank you.

Is it true,
that story about the young man...

who killed himself for her?
- Don't know.

Yes, it's true.
On the marketplace at Louang Prabang,

the day she left.
He was her lover.

The smoke doesn't bother you?
I mean, in here?

No, not at all.

You're at Saigon High School?
- Yes. But I sleep elsewhere,

at the Lyautey boarding house.
- You like studying?

Yes. I find it interesting.

What grade are you in?
- Eleventh.

And you're...
- Uh. Seventeen. And you?

Thirty-two and jobless.

And Chinese, what's more?

What's more, yes.

You look so beautiful when you say that.

Since my mother's death,
my father has lived on his cot.

He never leaves his opium pipe,
and he nearly doesn't eat anymore.

I never guessed
the depth of their fondness.

It's been ten years that he's taking care
of his business like that, from his bed.

He stares at the river, you see.
- I see.

Yes, I miss Paris,

the parties,
the evenings in Montparnasse.

The Coupole.
Do you know The Coupole?

I went to France once, it was
in the North, near the Belgian border.

I only know here: the Mekong, Saigon.

You like Saigon?
- Yes, I like Saigon.

I like Saigon too. Cholon above all.
Cholon, it's like China.

That's it. It's here.

Good-bye.

In all the public buildings
of the colonies.

We shall remember this saying:
No need to be rich to be clean.

First lesson.
Let's kill the flies that kill us...

You got here earlier than usual.
- I met someone on the ferry

who drove me here.
A Chinaman.

Helene is the only other White girl
in the boarding house.

Héléne, she is immodest,
she doesn't realize,

she walks naked in the dormitory and
doesn't know that she is very beautiful.

She is innocent,
lingering on in youth.

Hey, I forgot to tell you something.

There's a girl,
the Assistant-Mistresses found her,

she was a prostitute every evening
behind the wall. Nobody noticed anything.

Who?
- Alice.

Alice? Who is she going with like that?
- Anybody. People walking by.

It always appealed to me.
- What?

To go with me you don't know,

you don't even see them, nothing,
you'll never know their face.

Do you think we're all like that?
- Yes.

The assistant-mistresses, too.
Every woman.

Actually, I'd rather be a prostitute
than take care of lepers.

What are you talking about again?
- That's what everybody says here.

They say they want us to study.
But it's not true.

They take us into boarding so they can
send us to the lazarets, with the lepers,

the plague-stricken, the cholera-ridden.
I'd rather be a prostitute.

They'd be lucky, those men.

Gymnasium Chasseloup-Laubat

I'm the matador. You're the bull.
Eyes on one level, shoulders straight.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six.

Look over my left shoulder,
back out, arms locked,

bottom in. And One. Two. Three. Four.
Five. Six. Seven. Eight.

And one. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight.

It happened very quickly that day,
a holiday, a Thursday.

He came that Thursday afternoon
to the boarding house.

He came to wait for her
with the big black car.

It's early in the afternoon,
the time of the siesta.

It's Cholon,
in the alleyways of Cholon,

in the smell of soup, roast meat,
jasmin, dust,

charcoal fire,
in the smell of the Chinese town.

Please.

I didn't choose the furniture.
It's my father bought me this.

Young rich Chinese have mistresses,
and they call this the bachelor's room.

Do you have many mistresses?

Do you like the idea
of me having mistresses?

Yes, I do.

So, you followed me here
as you would have followed anyone.

I wouldn't know, I've never followed
anyone into a room yet.

[... I'm afraid.

I'm afraid of loving you.

Listen. We'll leave.
We'll come back some other time.

Well, I'd rather you didn't love me.

I want you to do
as you usually do with other women.

Is that what you want?

Yes.

I know you'll never love me.

I...
- I don't know.

I don't want you to talk.
Just do as usual.

He tore the dress off.

He tore the little white cotton
underpants off...

and he carried her like that...

...naked...

...to the bed.

Once on the bed, fear overcomes him.

He says it's not true,
that she's too little,

that he can't do such a thing. So...

So she's the one who does it.

Her eyes closed, she undresses him.

Button by button, sleeve by sleeve.

The skin.

The skin.

The skin is of a sumptuous softness.

The body is hairless,
without any virility at all...

other than that of the sex.

She doesn't look him in the face.

She touches him.

She touches the softness of the sex,
oft the skin,

she caresses the golden hue,
the unknown novelty.

I still see the place of distress,
shipwrecked,

the distempered walls, the slatted
shutters giving onto the furnace,

the soiling of the blood.

I remember well, the room is dark,

it's surrounded
by the never-ending clamour of the town,

carried away by the town,
by the flow of the town.

My body was in that public noise,

this passing-by from the outside,
exposed.

The sea, I thought, the immensity.

What are you thinking about?

They're dead.

Did it hurt you?

No.

Are you sad?

Yes, I guess. A little.
I don't know.

It's because we've made love
during the daytime,

in the dead of the heat.

No, it's me.

I'm always a little sad.

I'm like my mother.

When I told her I'd be a writer,
she shrugged.

She said it's not work,
it's a childish idea.

She wants me to do maths,
my mother does, to earn money.

What do you want to write?
- Books, novels...

about my elder brother,
to kill him,

to see him in pain,
to make him die.

About my younger brother,
to save him.

And about that,
about my mother's sadness,

about the lack of money, about shame.

I know the bad luck with your mother,
and the tragedies she's lived.

How do you know?
- Through the servants.

Through my driver.
You know everything through the servants.

I know about your elder brother, too.

I met him in the opium dens
along the riverside.

He smokes too much. Much too much.

The Whites don't know how to smoke.

He's an animal.
He scares me.

He steals from my mother to go smoke,

he steals from the servants.
My mother never says anything,

he's her favorite.

Since my father died
there's no money in the house.

My mother lost everything here.
She made all the wrong choices.

So, how do you manage?

We do the best we can.

We're shameless.
We do the best we can.

Did you come here because I've got money?

I don't know.

I came because I liked you.

Would you like me if I were poor?

I like you the way you are,
with your money.

I want to take you away.

I'd like to take you away leave with you.

I can't leave without my mother yet,
I'm too little.

I can't leave my mother,
nor my little brother, not yet.

I had asked him to do it again and again.

To do it to me. He had done it,

he had done it
in the unctuousness of blood.

I think he's used to it,
this is what he does in life,

love, nothing else,
I'm very lucky, obviously,

it's as if it were
a profession he'd have.

He's on me,
he engulfs himself again.

We stay like that, nailed,
moaning in the clamour of the town.

You see, you'll remember this afternoon
all your life.

Even if you have forgotten my face,
my name.

Do you think I'll remember the room?

Take a good look at it.

It's like anywhere.

That's it. It's like always.

I wonder how I found the strength

to go against the forbidden,

with this calm,
this determination,

how I succeeded in going all the way
to the end of the idea.

How could I have taken so much pleasure
for me alone with this unknown man?

My mother, she'll kill me
if she finds out the truth.

My brother He'd kill you.
Imagine with a Chinaman!

Since I've been little
she tells me

that here in the Colonies
a girl that isn't a virgin anymore

can no longer find a husband.
Do you think that's true?

Yes. Your mother's right.
It's no longer possible after that...

that dishonor.
For instance,

if I wanted to marry you, well,
this would not be allowed.

We can't tolerate the idea of that.
I'm Chinese.

I'm sorry.
Now that you have done that with me,

marriage between us would be impossible.

Well,
then it's for the best then Chinese.

I don't like the Chinese very much.

Hey!

Hey! Can I come into your bed?

No, not now.

I'll tell you about it tomorrow.

What's wrong, what's the matter?

Wait.

In Dubellay, the pretty one,
the mannered, the scholar, opposes ...

the expressive sincerity of Ronsard,
he is the poet of smiling sadness,

the painter of tender melancholy.
He said with emotion the brevity ...

of our earthly happiness,
he invites us to enjoy it ...

before misfortune
and death do not come upon us.

He is the ardent soul of the Pleiade.

Don't be bashful,

it's a wonderful report.
Nous avons ensuite...

She is the sole heiress
and I'm the sole heir

the date has been set for years, that's
another reason I came back from France.

You love her?
- No, I don't know her.

For us,
marriages are arranged by the families.

We know that a future together
is unthinkable,

so we speak of the future
in a casual manner,

without any involvement, detached.
- ... the two families got together

to hide their wealth away.
It's so much in the customs of ancient

or modern China, we don't think
we could do anything any other way.

He's never had a job.
He says that if he was poor,

it'd be terrible.
He'd be much too lazy to work.

It's opium that takes away the strength.
- No, it's wealth...

that takes his strength away.
He does nothing.

Nothing, only love.

But it's funny,
because that's the way I desire him.

Do you still love me?

We are lovers.
Every day,

we go back to the bachelor's room.
We can't stop loving.

This takes place in the sleazy district
of Cholon, every evening.

Every evening the little one comes
to receive the pleasure

that makes one scream from this dark man,

this man from Cholon, from China.

SA-DEC SCHOOL

C, I, G,

Al

Sit down.
I said sit down and be quiet.

I E!

Hi, Mom.

Hi, Paul.

Now and then, I go back
to the house in Sadec,

to the horror of the house in Sadec.

It is an unbearable place,
it is close to death,

a place of violence, of pain,
of despair. Of dishonor.

I forbid you to slam doors!
Do you hear me!

Who drove you back from Saigon?
- A friend. He lives in Vinh Long,

he offered to drop me off here.
- Who in Vinh Long?

You wouldn't know him,
he just got back from Paris.

A friend. A rich friend.
Not everybody's lucky enough to be poor.

And this! What's this?
- A piece of blue paper.

It's a telegram from the boarding house.
Where did you sleep Tuesday and Wednesday?

Not at the boarding house
the fans were out of order.

I slept with my friend from Vinh Long.
Is that what you want me to say?

Hit her, Mom,
don't let her get away with it!

Bit it is in this family's dryness,
in its incredible harshness,

that I am the most deeply assured
of myself, in the deepest...

of my essential certainties.
Our common history of ruin and shame,

of love and hate is in my flesh.

Your daughter looks like a whore.
Hey, damn it, stop that shooting!

This is, barring all other places,
where I live.

That was your dress, Mom! And you bought
the shoes for me! I wear them for months.

They were on sale, remember
final reductions, Rue Catinat.

You do it on purpose? You see
what a state I'm in because of you.

It's as though it makes you happy.

If you don't trust me anymore,
just take me out of the boarding house.

Besides, I'm not the one who asked
to be all alone all year long in Saigon.

The mother can be
very, very happy sometimes,

the time to forget.
That of washing the house

may suffice for my mother's happiness.
She plays the piano, sings and laughs.

And everyone thinks that one
can be happy in this gutted house

that suddenly becomes a swamp,
a field alongside a river,

a ford, a beach.

My respects, Madame.
- My mother,

my brother Pierre,

and my brother Paul.

On Saturday night, they're busy.

Will you be having a cocktail, Sir?
- Yes, three Martel-Perriers

and a bottle of rice wine.

We left China when Sun Yat Sen
decreed the Republic

and my father just sold all his lands
to the Japanese

who had already taken over Manchuria.
All the houses, jewels and everything,

to go down towards the South.

And my Mother...

she just lie on the road,
and she can't go in anymore...

The mother and the brothers
mustn't know a thing.

It is set by principle that he
is at my feet, that I'm with him

for the money, that I can't love him.
This, because he's Chinese,

because he's not White. My brothers
devour and don't speak a word to him.

I don't speak a word to him either.
In my family's presence,

he ceases to be my lover.
He doesn't cease to exist

but he's nothing to me anymore.
He becomes a burned-out place,

an unacceptable scandal,
a reason to be ashamed of,

that has to be hidden.

So, what are we waiting for?

I'd like to have a drink at "La Cascade".
- Your bill, Sir.

We'd like to go to "La Cascade”
to drink and dance.

What makes you laugh?
That I'm dancing with your sister?

I'm sorry, you're so badly paired.

Don't pay attention, Sir,
he's drunk, that's all.

What! Can't I laugh or what?

Do you wanna fight?
Take care little buddy,

it'd take two of you to do the job.

Oh no, a lot more than that.
Four of me you mean.

You have no idea how weak I am.

We should leave, forgive him, Sir,

forgive us.
I have not brought my children up well,

I'm paying for it.

I'm the one who's punished the most.

How much is what we did worth?

In a brothel, how much does it cost
to do what you just did to me?

How much do you need?

My mother needs 500 piastres.

I've got your money. Here.

Where's her office.
- It's over there.

We have to let her go free in the evening.
Not tell her what time to be in.

We mustn't force her to go on trips
with the boarders either.

She's always been a free child,
otherwise she'd run away.

Even I can't do a thing about that.
She's always worked very well in school,

even being so free.

The head-mistress accepted because I'm
White and that for the boarding house's

reputation, amongst all the half-casts,
there must be a few Whites.

She let me live in the boarding-house
as if it were a hotel.

Other than my French teacher,
nobody speaks to me at school.

It's because of you.
- That's your imagination.

No. There have been some complaints
from families. They say I'm a slut

who goes to the shady part of town
to have her body fondled by a Chinaman.

It's nothing.

That's true. It's nothing.

It touched her. She's dirty.
- She's the one with the Chinaman.

I don't want to touch
the ball after it's touched her.

Come along girls, back to your classes.
Playtime is over. Don't dawdle, Henrietta.

One day, you're going
to go back to France.

I can't take that.

When are you going back to France?
- At the end of the school year.

But it's not sure.

My mother has a lot of difficulty
in leaving here.

The stone belonged to my mother.

Take it.

Your father is waiting for you,
young master.

Master.

Dad.

Today, I come to see you.

I think you know I got
acquainted with a French girl.

I confess I'm always be with her

I can't leave her.

I love her very much.

Just a year.

Dad, I beg you to permit
us to marry for a year.

We will see what to do
after a year. Dad, do you agree?

I can't promise you.

Ten years ago,

I have made

a marriage arrangement for you.

I reached an agreement with
the parents of your bride-to-be.

No one can intervene.

Dad.

Stop arguing.

An I say to him that it's too new,
it's too strong,

and I say to him that it is horrid
to take you away from my body.

I say to him that he, my father,
he should know what it is,

a love like this,

so strong that it'll never happens again
in a lifetime,

never.

He wants this marriage
with this young girl I've never seen.

He shows no mercy for me.

Shows none for anyone.

And you, do you want this marriage?

The question is not
of wanting or not wanting.

I'm nothing without my father's wealth.

He told me,

I'd rather see you dead than know
you were with that white girl.

But he's right. He's right
because anyhow ['ll leave.

And I have no love for you.

You see,
it's here my mother,

when I was little, wanted to erect
a dam to protect her good-growing land.

She wanted to become rich for us.
She put all the savings left

after my father's death into it.

People lied to her,
the land registrar agents

sold her flood-lands,
just to earn their premium.

Salt-water covered everything.
She lost everything here, everything.

It took her years to believe
that it was possible for people

to steal all her savings
and then never acknowledge her again,

to throw her out.
She would scream, she had fits.

People started to say that she was crazy,

to not believe what she said about her
money anymore, to say that she was lying.

We never saw another White person
for years.

The Whites were ashamed of us.
She had to give everything up.

The upper rice-paddy,
she gave it to the servants,

along with the bungalow
and all the furniture.

We used to sit here
with my mother and my little brother,

and we'd watch the sky of Siam
over there, behind the mountains.

You feel cold?
- A little.

That evening I know it,
I know only that,

later I will write my mother's life.

How she was killed
by the land-registrar agents,

robbed by the government officials.

To write.
That's what I see beyond the moment,

in the great desert,
under the features...

of which I see the extent of my life.

Is she beautiful?
- She's rich.

The family chose her also
because of that.

She is covered with gold,

jade and diamonds.

Did you ever sleep with a white girl
before me?

Yes,

in Paris, of course,

here no.
- Why?

Here, other than French prostitutes,
it's impossible to have white women.

Totally impossible.

I want you to say it to me once,

you came here so that I'd give you money.

I came here so that you'd give me money.

Repeat after me.

I was thinking about money,
and only about money,

from the moment I saw you on the ferry.

I was thinking about money,
and only about money,

since the moment I saw you on the ferry.

You're a whore. You're a whore.

I don't find that disgusting
on the contrary.

You know,

before you,

I knew nothing about suffering.

I would love to...

I would love to take you.

But I'm without strength,

I'm without any strength at all.

I'm dead.

I have no desire for you.

My body no longer wants the one
who doesn't love.

Do you know what that's worth?
You want to have us believe

he just gave it to you
for your pretty face?

Why did he give you such a diamond?

Why? Because, he's rich!
- Your daughter's whoring!

Take it! Sell it!
See if I care about that ring!

You slept with him, I'm sure of it.
Just take a look at her! She's a disgrace.

You've got to do something, Mum!
- What are you saying?

Me? With a Chinaman!? Nothing happened,
nothing! Not even a kiss!

It smells of Chinese!

You slept with him, huh?

Say it!

Say it, say it.

You gonna say it, you bitch!
You filthy bitch!

You slept with a chink!
Did you like it!

Stop it! Stop it! For God's sake!
You're killing her, Pierre!

I thought my child wouldn't come anymore.

I took a rickshaw.

Did you smoke a lot?

That's all I do.

I have no desire left.
I have no love left.

It's wonderful.

It's as though we'd never met,

or as though you'd left months ago.

When are you getting married?

Next Friday,

and you're leaving
on the "Alexander Dumas" the twelfth.

Look at me.

I'm going to die of love for you.

After your marriage,
we'll meet here one time.

Just once. You remember?
You promised me.

You're also selling the rose wood table?

Yes I'm leaving everything.
It's all finished here.

The only thing I'll miss
are the metal beds.

In France, the beds are too soft.

What's that hat?
- Mom,

I've been wearing it for months!

Did I buy that for you?
- Who else? Some days...

we can make you buy anything we want.
- I forgot.

You know, I wasn't like you.

I didn't study as easily as you do

and I...

I was very serious...

for so long, too long.

That's how I lost the feeling
of my own pleasure.

He did a really good thing, truly.
- Who did a good thing?

Your friend, your Chinese friend.

He paid off your brother's debts
at the opium den.

He also paid for the trip,
he was wonderful, very discreet, too.

I had underestimated him.
I'm sorry about that.

Do you only see him for the money?

Yes.

(Chinese)

It was when the boat
uttered its first farewell,

when the gangway had been hauled up
and the tugs had started to tow it,

to draw it away from land,
that she had wept.

She'd done it without showing her tears.

Without showing her mother or her
little brother that she was sad,

without showing anything,
as was the custom between them.

He was there.

That was him in the back,
that scarcely visible shape,

that made no movement, crushed.

She was leaning on the railing
like the first time on the ferry.

She knew he was watching her.
She was watching him, too.

She couldn't see him anymore,

but she still looked towards
the shape of the black car.

In the end, she didn't see it anymore.

The harbor had faded away
and then the land.

One night, during the crossing
of the Indian Ocean,

in the main room, on the big deck, there
was a sudden burst of a waltz by Chopin.

There wasn't a breath of wind, and that
night, the music had spread all over

the black liner, like an injunction
from heaven related to something unknown,

like an order from God
whose meaning was inscrutable.

She had wept because she had thought
of that man from Cholon, her lover,

and suddenly she wasn't not sure
of not having loved him

with a love she hadn't seen
because it had lost itself

in the story like water in the sand
and that she was rediscovering it

now in this moment of music
flung across the sea.

Years after the war, after the marriages,
the children the divorces,

the books, he had come to Paris
with his wife.

He had phoned her.

He was intimidated, his voice trembled.

And with the trembling,
it had found the accent of China again.

He knew she'd begun writing books,
he had also heard

about the younger brother's death,
he had been sad for her.

And then he hadn't known
what to tell her.

And then he'd told her.
He had told her that it was as before,

that he still loved her,
that he would never stop loving her,

that he would love her until his death.