Original subtitles

It has definitely nothing to do with jealousy.

It is more dreadful than that.

It was just a kind of hatred and no events took part in it.

I killed her…

…because her life was the blatant denial of everything I loved…

…of all that mattered to me.

She was for me a living denial:

…she was constantly denouncing my slightest desire…

…my most trivial thought.

Why did we meet?

Why didn’t we stop looking at each other immediately?

I first saw her in a "cellar"…

…and I immediately got the feeling she would be out of my league.

Is it the reason why I started to long for her…

…as it had never happened before with another girl?

Why did I pay attention to her?

It was because of a mere nothing - the way her cheekbones were slightly bulging…

…and maybe also this constant look of sadness…

…that one could find even in her smile.

Almost one year ago, everything was fine.

I loved being an architect and I had the brightest future.

I had set up my own company…

…and I was in charge of major contracts.

After going through difficult times…

…I was finally successful.

Was I happier?

What kind of stress did I really experience in this late winter?

I feared to have sacrificed my best years to my ambition.

I was frantically in search of lost time…

…and yet I didn’t dare to leave the neighborhood of my twenties.

I had started thinking about getting married:

my loneliness was more humiliating than painful

and I thought my ego was also entitled to be satisfied.

I was bored and didn’t try anything to get out of my boredom.

I had stopped seeing in this world anything picturesque.

At the most, the dreary apathy of theses faces…

…could have been able to give me…

…a little comfort.

I liked thinking these kids were older than me…

…that their ways, their enthusiasms…

…were comparable to those I had experienced ten years earlier.

I needed a breath of fresh air.

Yet I was living in a wax museum.

The times of "good old fellowship" were gone.

I was going to become a mere "bourgeois"…

…someone being used, a "tourist" as we used to call them.

Because I was known in the neighborhood…

…I was still experiencing a kind of privilege.

But there was already a gap between me and the new generation.

What was she looking for in this place?

Just like me, she didn’t seem ready to live as a bohemian.

People in this place seemed to belong to the same family…

…but both of us were very different from them…

…and this fact made us suspect to the others.

I had the feeling she was as bored as me…

…that we’ve got the same defect…

…and owing to this I found her more attractive.

I was more and more suffering from being an outcast.

All the tricks were good…

…to try to maintain my unsteady prestige.

I came with a friend of mine, a journalist.

We pretended to study the youth

..so that our presence was less strange.

These tests were like a board game.

Our explanations were of course fanciful.

But we tried our best to be respectful of egos.

And everybody accepted to submit to our exam.

It was fun and it made me feel comfortable.

But it was also widening the gap…

…between them and I.

I felt like saying a last goodbye to the people of the neighborhood.

What was I waiting for?

Was it because of her presence?

I had discovered a few clues showing her relationship was coming to an end.

Our eyes met once or twice…

…and I had perceived in her look an obvious curiosity.

I started…

…to be hopeful.

It was strange that our meeting

- in a so small place -

…did not happen before.

Our first meeting was disappointing:

It took place, by coincidence…

…in psychological circumstances.

I thought she had something mysterious.

But maybe I was wrong.

I was surprised by her trivial…

…and prosaic answers.

What I had called anxiety, deep torment…

was maybe just a kind of indifference…

…a kind of weakness of nature.

But it was difficult to admit I had made a mistake…

…and I couldn’t resist the temptation to seduce her.

Because of her lack of will…

…I expected to conquer her easily…

…and, hypocritically, I was satisfied.

Indeed, I despised her to be so easily bluffed…

…as she should have despised me…

…to be so cautious to seduce her.

She had no confidence in herself.

She was looking for someone who would be able to bully her…

…or at least be able to give her a goal

- something she was unable to discover by herself.

On my side, I was just thinking to adapt myself to her…

…and to study her.

I was planning to do it in this way…

…but I was the victim of my own imagination.

The girl in front of me, was she really the same person?

How could I be so blind?

As a substitute to her I fancied a creature of fiction

- a sort of ideal woman one could dream about at sixteen -

I tried to speak when she was silent, abusing myself on my own "construct".

I was just expecting one thing from her:

Not to demolish, by being suddenly frank…

…my laborious "construct".

My only goal was to get married.

I did not really care about her.

I just wanted her to be here when needed…

…in the place I had assigned to her in the plan I had drawn up.

I thought that at my age I have a right to what I stupidly called "love" or "happiness".

My only concern was my success:

a match between the event and my views.

I was not really surprised by the easiness of my victory.

I only wanted to see at work the sign of a benevolent destiny.

I only had to collect the ripe fruit.

All was in my favor:

She had given up her studies halfway.

She didn’t wish to go back to her parent’s.

And she had just put an end to her relationship.

I was confident:

she was impressed by the people I frequented

- people I personally found boring.

Her life was dull and my friends were wonderful to her opinion.

She arrived from her countryside.

She had only met kids of her age who bullied her.

My concern for her made her accept the idea of getting married…

…in less time than I would have thought.

Why did she accept so quickly?

Was she ambitious or venal?

She could have found someone richer.

Was it out of spite or out of boredom?

Was it because she could not stand my insistence?

Because I knew, at least at that time…

…how to get to her vanity.

Did she stop believing in love and was ready to experience the worst?

Did she estimate that her decision was not so absurd?

Did she plan to take advantage of the weakness…

…she perceived in me?

When I was at the top of my anger I accused her of having yielded to despair…

…and to the most sordid plan.

I know for sure she never loved me.

Her face was always expressionless; she always expressed the same hostile passivity

…and the same resigned laziness.

She obviously loathed this marriage.

And yet, no union had ever been made so freely.

I always respectfully asked for her opinion.

I respected her freedom just as mine.

Her agreement was boosting my pride.

It was for me the most important thing.

What would be the next step?

I was a little bit worried about our future

…but I didn’t really want to think about it.

How could I be so wrong?

I believed a new era would come…

…an era totally different to what I experienced before.

I was eager to leave the neighborhood of my youth -

a youth I was estimating dull and congealed.

I despised people for getting stuck in their habit…

…for always experiencing the same dull pleasures

- pleasures I had been myself experiencing for too long.

I felt sorry for them…

…totally devoted to what I pretentiously called love.

Was I really in love?

Today I don’t believe it anymore.

Only my pride was at stake.

I was proud to see on their face…

…this benevolent irony that boosted my vanity.

Their poorly disguised jealousy…

…was my best support…

…my purest pleasure…

…and maybe the whole reason of my happiness.

Their jealousy was a sufficient judgment for me.

Nothing was sincere inside me…

…except the pleasure I got from their judgment.

I gave to myself the right to despise my past life.

I was not seeing on what a precarious basis…

…I was going to build my future life.

I was not aware of the boredom which already leaked out under our forced cheerfulness…

and of the grin our smiles could hardly hide.

A few months had passed since our wedding…

…and I had to recognize the obvious truth:

I had been wrong about her…

…in the same way she must have been wrong, I guess, about me.

We were the least compatible couple in the world.

We were still smiling at each other by courtesy…

…by habit… by pride.

It was difficult for both of us to admit our mistake.

By fear of destroying everything…

…I always postponed having with her a straightforward discussion.

I had hoped that our common life, our household problems and our work…

…would smooth out our dissimilarities.

I wished that she would say or do something - in vain.

I vainly tried to remember…

…any sign of affection from her.

She was behaving…

…as if being married with her should be sufficient for my happiness.

But she made clear there was no love between us…

…and that there would not be ever.

Other couples experienced difficult starts.

My sin, my crime was to refuse to bow to common law…

and to believe that nothing else was possible…

…outside of this crumbling fairy tale.

To be friends or to appreciate each other seemed to me not enough.

I could not admit that fighting for years to find happiness…

…was better than experiencing the most wonderful myth.

After experiencing the top of my happiness…

…totally focused on getting the best of it…

…I started to perceive the slope that led to misfortune…

…and I was fascinated by its vertiginous curve.

It seemed already impossible to backtrack.

We realized that we had nothing left to say.

All our projects were stuck.

Our apartment had the same cold appearance since the first day I moved in.

We were both living in a world apart…

…in an incommunicable dream.

What was her dream, what was she thinking about?

To her bad luck, to her mistake?

Why didn’t she even try to accuse me?

Why did she remain silent, why was she so disdainful?

I started to loathe her…

…and I thought she started to loathe me.

These barriers every couple has to overcome at least once

…blocked my horizon…

…forever.

When the first quarrels broke…

…I felt like a relief, a kind of pleasure:

these feelings were replacing my desire to love and to be loved.

If other people were quarreling and hypocritically reconciling as we did…

…I would have found that kind of behavior vulgar and squalid.

I found something virtuous and noble in our quarrels…

…when they were not.

I had the feeling to live at last.

Everything seemed to me better than the boredom…

…we were usually experiencing.

I hoped that these petty arguments…

…would clear the air.

But I had the feeling that my fits of anger were just momentarily suspended…

…that I was going to be the plaything of another unknown power…

…and I was already anticipating the thrill of it.

I was in this state of mind when I met this guy in the early winter.

This young and highly rated critic had asked me to write an article.

I estimated his gift.

We had the same tastes but totally opposed characters.

This contrast, far from dividing us, helped us to become closer.

I was eager to stop thinking about my own problems.

I always liked to be with friends different from me.

Of course my wife did not welcome him…

…just like all the people I introduced to her.

Everything I was linked with…

- my friends, my tastes, my cravings -

…never found her approval.

I was irritated but also flattered…

…that she ignored others just like she was doing with me.

I knew that women used to like him and I stood on guard.

I was so utterly dismayed at that time…

…that I was the plaything of the most opposite thoughts.

Sometimes I wished he would manage to entertain her…

…and to make appear on her face…

…a smile I haven’t been seeing for months.

Sometimes I rather hoped…

…that she would loathe him…

…that she would blame me for liking him and do everything to break our new friendship.

The latter wish was the one I had deep in my heart.

Unfortunately I got the feeling reality would be the opposite of my desire.

It was like testing her.

If she cannot bear being with him, I thought,

…maybe nothing is lost.

But if he has any hold on her…

…it will definitely prove that our union…

…was the saddest misunderstanding ever.

I bet and I lost.

My last hopes flew away with my first suspicions.

I was definitely full of hatred.

Nothing could change it.

That night, I realized for the first time

…what was the exact nature of my anger.

While everybody was worrying or plotting…

I was focused on my jealousy and my despair.

Because of her, because of him, I started focusing on their complicity.

Meanwhile, I could also easily hear the impact of each bow stroke…

…of each piano key.

Music is a terrible thing:

One said it calms, it ennobles: it’s not true.

Music can only give some excitement…

…a pure and hopeless excitement.

It strengthens your internal agony…

…without giving you any help to end it.

The impetuosity of this first presto…

…was so close to my evening thoughts…

…that it didn’t appease them…

…but rather excited them.

I knew I was waiting for something to happen…

…something extremely violent and dreadful.

Definitely, music does not appease.

Like alcohol or a drug…

…it makes believe our meanest feelings are great.

Music can cope with our moods.

It can lead them to insanity, to climax.

But it can also make us slaves of them.

Nothing was important for me but my anger.

I pampered it, I enjoyed it…

…just like a first love.

It was my only friend, my only support, my only refuge.

Between the triviality…

…of the world where the others were rotting…

…and the fascinating beauty of the world my anger made me perceive

…there was no debate.

I had to give way to my anger…

…and I had to follow its every whim, its lower requirements.

I had to obey my anger

…wherever and whatever it would require…

…until madness… disaster… and even murder.

She loved him.

It was obvious even for someone blind.

He was the only one she was smiling at, looking at…

…speaking to - with endearing words she never used with me.

He was the only one who can witness her devotion, her joy.

This could not happen.

Yet it was taking place nearby me, almost under my eyes.

I stopped feeling remorse about my crisis.

The only thing I knew was they would burst out with more violence…

…and would have no limit.

Everything was a pretext for my anger, like the slightest absence or phone call.

I would have liked to destroy her, to crush her, to dissolve her…

…until nothing would remain of her.

But I knew it was not possible, not yet possible.

My anger was still not strong enough to force me to do this.

It was still circumscribed…

…by a residue of will even when I was going mad.

She believed that I was acting…

…that I wanted to frighten her - whereas I was just ridiculous.

I didn’t pay attention to the way she reacted.

It was like the rehearsal of the final act…

…that would happen sooner or later.

It was something too important, too dreadful…

…to burst out suddenly…

…without any trial, any previous mistakes, any remorse.

Why didn’t she leave?

I think I would have let her go.

Did she refuse to take my anger seriously?

Or was he manipulating her?

Was she trying to be sure of his sincerity before breaking with me?

I got the idea she tried to play for time…

…and that she was pretending.

Her way to pretend deceived me…

…but reassured my rational side at the same time.

As matters stood…

…the slightest spark could have all ignited.

When I was quiet…

I tried thinking about everything…

(as both of us were apparently coping with the circumstances)

…that delayed the upcoming final burning.

She promised me to stop seeing him.

I was so naive I did not doubt her word.

I believed she was not able to deeply love someone…

…or to be faithful to a whim.

Thus I took her at her words…

…and a visible peace prevailed during a couple of weeks.

Then I worked a lot…

…and I often had to leave home.

One evening I came back home unexpectedly.

I smelt a familiar odor of Turkish cigarettes…

…and I realized the ashtray was perfectly clean:

I had no doubt she was acting.

For me it was like taking a cold shower.

But instead of getting angry I remained perfectly quiet.

As she was seeing him in our place…

…it would not be difficult to catch them in the act.

I decided to pretend being joyful…

…and she behaved likewise, not to be outdone.

She was acting so well…

…it strengthened my previous decision.

As soon as I got the opportunity…

…I pretended to have a business trip.

This was this very morning.

The imminent outcome

…brought back my former moods.

I just feared my trick was useless.

I could stand anything but the failure of my plot.

If I caught them in the act it would be harrowing:

But it would be the abrupt end of my doubts…

…which had still survived against all reason.

But nothing was more painful than these doubts.

And what can put an end to my doubts

…except something irreparable?

My pain was so strong…

…I wanted to go far away and never return.

Then I thought walking in fresh air would make me good.

For a minute I had the idea to jump in front of a truck…

…to quickly put an end to the whole story.

But it would have been too easy for her.

I didn’t care about happiness or sadness anymore.

All that mattered to me was to get revenge.

What would happen next - precisely?

I could not say.

It would depend on them, on me and especially on my anger.

I knew that I would give way to my anger…

…let it guide me…

…and let it take all the necessary initiatives.

I had the feeling he was a little bit stronger than me:

It would prevent me from fighting in cold blood…

…and thus I could use any means.

I would seize whatever I found…

…a press book, a lamp, a chair…

…or this dagger placed on the shelf of the antechamber…

…where the fight should take place.

I would fight foolishly, like a madman…

…without trying to hurt him personally…

- I could never really hate him -

…but because it would be the natural consequence of my wrath…

…because the dream I forged…

…had to find in the real world its answer.

He tried to avoid the fight.

Everything was happening in an ordinary way.

She kept on looking at me contemptuously…

…not more scared than usual.

My weakening anger had to quickly rise again.

Soon it would be too late.

It finally happened what I had thought…

…but not in the way I had thought it would.

What I dreamt to do…

…being totally blind…

…I accomplished it being fully aware of my deed.

These gestures that I imagined in my crisis…

…I accomplished them driven by my will.

At every moment I knew what I was doing.

Everything was going in a necessary and inevitable way.

Nothing could stop me.

As if this dreadful end…

…justified, magnified…

…all the doubts I had experienced…

…during the whole process.