If you’ve seen anything by legendary French filmmaker Philippe Garrel (“The Secret Child,” “I Don’t Hear the Guitar Anymore”) then you know how obsessed he can be with the topic of love, more specifically the infinite complications that arise in relationships. His latest film, “The Salt of Tears”, (Berlin Film Festival '20), filmed in gorgeous black-and-white by maestro Renato Berta, is another intimate romantic drama about the ties that bind. It follows Luc (Logann Antuofermo) an impulsive young Frenchman who, as he’s about to leave town to a prestigious cabinetmaking school, seduces a young woman (Oulaya Amamraat) he meets at a bus stop and makes her enter his toxic world. Problems arise when Luc hooks up with a former flame (Louise Chevillotte) which results in his having to juggle a trio of relationships (and his own ego) and deciding exactly who and what he wants. This is a slight, but effective treatise on l’amour from Garrel, but it’s also his most insightfully luring film since 2015’s “In the Shadows of Women.” It isn’t just Luc who yearns for love, but all three main characters, they all try to -impossibly- define what love should feel and look like. It’s a losing game, but that wanting desire culminates into tragedy by film’s end. [B]
“The Salt of Tears” will be streaming on MUBI starting Friday, April 9th.