boydwalters-60323 I saw this when I was a teenager and didn't know what the fuss was about and had a feeling it was pandering to people who like to think they are clever ... I watched it again last night, 40 years later as I thought maybe I was too young and had missed something ... I hadn't Good Points ... Its quite nicely filmed, but how could you go wrong in such sumptuous surroundings ... Delphine Seyrig was an amazingly interesting and beautiful woman, although she hasn't reached her peak in this ... There are no more good points The writing and direction are both stilted and heavy handed in their determination to be obtuse ... Their arrogance and self importance literally drips off the screen ... Compare this to the films of Cocteau who was a true talent ... Unfortunately some films have always been bolstered by the faux intellectual bourgeoisie and this is one of the major players in that category ... It is of course complete and utter nonsense

writers_reign Although he'd been active in French cinema since 1947 Alain Resnais had the misfortune to make two landmark films during the short-lived so called New Wave hiccup which lasted something like four years from the late 1950s to the early 1960s but like Louis Malle, who began his own career at roughly the same time, and was tarred erroneously with the same brush, Resnais went on to become a highly distinguished mainstream filmmaker. One doesn't have to look far to see that Marienbad has little or no relationship to the dross being turned out by Godard and Truffaut; for one thing the genuine new waveleteers took misplaced pride in shooting on the street and making a movie for a stick of gum with friends and acquaintances handling most of the technical jobs, while from the very first frame it is evident that Marienbad employed top technicians to create and shoot the stunning effects, as well as spending lavishly on costume - every single person on screen, without exception, is in formal attire, tuxedos for the men, evening dress for the women, and groomed within an inch of their lives. This leaves us with the problematical screenplay by Alain Robbe Grillet but since I have no more idea than the regular film buff of what 1) it is about or 2) what it means I'm quite happy to let the Academic-Pseud axis compare orgasms, say that it's stunning to look at and leave it at that.

cinephilereview I was first introduced to this film in college.The first viewing stunned me. I was literally hypnotized by the imagery and the aura.Years passed, and I saw it again on DVD. It was as if I was inside the film again, repeating my life at Marienbad. A couple of weeks ago, I was deeply saddened to hear the news of the passing of the great French director Alain Resnais. Among the numerous pieces I have of his, I picked this out and saw it again. It was magical, as it always was. Too bad they don't make movies like this anymore. But still… Long live cinema!

SeaHorseMafia I have been awaiting to see this for so long and now finally did, it wasn't anything like I expected. So abstract, so unique, so layered and so experimental in many ways. It's just so over-whelming really. There are so many aspects of this movie that just baffle me in a away that won't leave me confused, but over-whelms me with different perspectives. Like how the people freeze all of the sudden, the dialog is cut off but we can see their mouths still moving and a lot more. There are many, many different analysis of the movie, and I don't agree or disagree with any of them. Only one I do agree (in some way), that they are all dead, in a limbo. That makes, at least IMO, kinda sense. But I don't agree with the people who say that there's nothing to get (I sort of agree who say the film is satirizing itself though), that it's confusing to the point, you shouldn't know what it's about. I think that's just a cheap excuse to not understanding the movie or not wanting to analyze this. Saying this film doesn't have a meaning is simply dumbing the movie down a lot. Then, what is this movie in my opinion about? Well, I think this movie is about sub-consciousness story-telling. What does that mean? It's a term I have some up with, it's a kind of story- telling that makes the audience make up the story them self, in their sub-conscious. We are given so little about the story, that we make our own mind what is the story about. We decide did they meet, we decide what did the people say (when the dialog was cut off) and we decide how it ended. Alain Resnais himself said that everybody has to make their own mind about the story. This could be so abstract it's satirical in a way. And maybe Resnais wanted it to be almost a parody of itself, by being so surreal and impossibly to understand fully, maybe. I don't want to think like that, to me that would take way a lot of this movies appeal. It's meant to be understood, but it's meant to be understood for many angles. So, I guess it could be a parody. But it also kinda makes fun of the creativity that wasn't in main-stream Hollywood at that time. How creativity is dead in films now. One guy here in IMDb said it the best about this movie, something about how the woman represents current film-making and how "she" can't remember her golden days. That was pretty spot on. A lot of people hate this film. I can understand it, it's not for everybody, because there is no clear answer anything nor a clear story. If you don't like experimental film, this isn't for you. If your looking for something new, something that's trying to invent how you see movies in a different way, this is for you. To some people it's a mystery (actually to everybody pretty much) and a lot of people don't like the ambiguity of the story. It's a kind of movie that respects it's audience, nothing telling them everything, but respecting the audience to make up their own mind. And I understand that some of you don't like that at all. To some it's simply not "fun". And I understand that. But how can't you love the cinematography, the sets and the unique decisions in direction and the over-all uniqueness?