Careful! Everything is old and sepulchral here.
Until yesterday nobody had entered this room except for him and me...
...in all these years that he lived in Bruges.
And yesterday?
You're his friend, Mister Frank, so I can tell you.
He seemed completely transformed yesterday.
He was trembling with excitement, sobbing and laughing.
'Open the doors!' he said, 'Let the light into my temple! The dead are waking!'
I never heard this before. Strange!
Look. Roses on the frames and at the door of her room,
where she died.
This picture in particular he decorated beautifully.
Is that her? Marie?
Yes, that was her. In the bright, soft dress that he loved so much.
Beautiful! Lord! How her hair shines!
Beneath, there's a lock of her hair.
Liquid gold, isn't it so?
He kept it? Strange.
Here, everything speaks of his dead wife.
He calls it: 'The Temple of Memory'
He lives like this?
Always, until yesterday. He used to say:
'Bruges and I, we are one. We worship the greatest beauty:
the past.'
And you, Brigitta? Can you bear it? You, a woman?
Aren't you tempted to venture out into life?
I don't know what life is, Mister Frank,
because I'm alone.
But here, here there is love, Mister Frank, that I know.
And where there is love, a poor woman is content to serve.
Frank! Friend!
Brigitta led me to the 'Temple of Memory'.
Of Memory? No!
Quickly run down to the garden, fetch roses!
Two arms full. Let it glow here with roses.
You saw her picture.
Yes, she was beautiful, what a loss for you.
Marie, your breath, your eyes. What did you say? She was beautiful?
- Indeed. - She was beautiful, you say?
She is beautiful! She is, she is!
- In your imagination? - No, no, she lives!
Soon she'll be here, she's coming back.
Oh, listen to me now!
You know that I stayed in Bruges in order to be alone with my dead wife.
The dead wife, the dead city became a mysterious allegory.
And every day I took the same path, arm in arm with her shadow, towards the water...
...staring at the surface,
tearfully longing for her precious image...
...the sweet, gently withdrawn gaze,
the shimmer of her golden hair.
And yesterday I again dreamed of the vanished one...
...of her, Marie.
While thinking, I hear the echo of footsteps.
I'm listening. A shadow floats over the water. I look up:
A woman stands in front of me in the sunlight.
Frank! A woman!
Marie's golden hair sparkles in the glow of noon,
Marie's smile glides from her lips.
No longer a resemblance, no, a miracle!
It appeared to be her, she, my wife!
Yes, my living, my breathing wife!
A fever for my former happiness took hold of me.
'God', I cried, 'if you feel merciful towards me, return her to me!'
And today at noon I spoke to her, with a trembling heart...
...and the greatest of all miracles.
Marie's voice sounded from her mouth!
An unfamiliar woman in quiet Bruges?
I don't know who she is. I invited her to join me in my loneliness.
And she's coming, and in her comes my dead wife, comes Marie.
Listen, Paul, you're risking a dangerous game. You're a dreamer,
a visionary, but I see things, see women the way they are.
Do you want to live suspended between life and death?
Force a living being to become like the one who has died?
Calm yourself! You were alone for too long.
Your blood rebels against this sorrow.
Move on, embrace a beautiful woman, but let the dead sleep.
I want to deepen the dream of return, want to see her walk through this door,
shine upon this room, in which her lovely scent still lingers.
Feel the presence of her sweet being.
And in her returns Marie, returns my dead wife.
You are seeking a phantom!
This journey has led me to you just in time.
My friend, your deep feeling has confused you,
your deep feeling shall also heal you.
I'm leaving, but I'll be back soon.
The delusion recedes, the fog will lift.
I only belong to you, who will never be lost to me!
Who can understand it, the deep, mysterious connection of our souls?
You remnant of her beauty.
So you will rise again, lovely? So I will once again...
...see the glistening golden locks shine on your white brow?
Roses, very good.
Sir, veiled. A lady.
Why didn't you say so? Bring her in.
Mister Paul, consider what others will say.
If you love me, be silent and obey.
Marie! Once more I breathe in your fragrance.
I see you. I can feel you.
Now, God, give her back to me!
- Wonderful! - Yes, wonderful.
I'm astonished myself, I hardly understand what lured me here.
You were pleading quite urgently.
And now not a word of gratitude, no greeting?
Rather nice in here. You seem to be rich?
And roses. They glow like fire.
Stiff and silent still? How fitting for Bruges.
In this dead nest with its gloomy rigidity!
Here too it's as sombre as in a tomb!
I'm suffocating. But it won't get me down!
I'm cheerful and love pleasure, love great joys, love the sun!
The sun laughs in this hair.
And here it shines on pictures of beautiful ladies.
The gallery of women you have loved?
The silver gleam of the voice, the melodious tilt of the shoulders.
Off with the coat, am I not beautiful? More beautiful than them?
All of that was beautiful. You are.
By God, your dress, the same colour, almost the same cut.
An old shawl, would match that dress.
May I drape it around your beautiful shoulders?
You want me to be even more beautiful?
Fine, how soft the old silk is. It makes me shudder pleasantly.
A mirror, quick, a mirror!
- Marie! - Marie?
My name is Marietta. What's the matter?
Nothing, forgive me.
Please forgive me, and please also take this.
The old lute?
Are you a painter and need a model?
Well, an old song goes with the old lute.
What, you sing?
Tolerably, they say, even though it's not my field.
And sad tunes are my favorite.
Probably because I'm so happy otherwise.
Shall I? So listen.
'Joy that has stayed with me, come closer, my faithful love.'
'The evening sinks into the grove, you're my light and day.'
'Two fearful hearts beat side by side, hope sways towards the sky.'
How true, a sad song.
The song about a faithful love which has to die.
What's the matter?
I know the song. I heard it often in younger, happier days.
It has one more stanza. Can I remember it?
'Although bleak sorrow is approaching, come closer, my faithful love.'
'Tilt your pale face, dying will not separate us.'
'If you must leave me one day, believe me, you'll be restored to life.'
The silly song has cast a spell on you.
- Ah, listen. - 'Why on earth are you tardy!'
- They're singing different songs... - 'Haven't even kissed you...'
- ...singing in a different tone, not sentimental. - '...yet today.'
'Diridi, diridon, beautiful Marion.'
It's Gaston. How delightfully he sings.
'Even the most beautiful day does not count as lived if you didn't tremble in my arms.'
'Diridi, diridon, beautiful Marion.'
Bravo!
The people of Bruges, no one must see you here.
He goes out with Juliette and Lucienne, loops arm into arm and thinks of Marion.
They're friends, strolling before the rehearsal. I, too, have to leave for the theatre.
- You? - Well, yes, we're performing here.
- I'm a dancer. - You, a dancer?
Indeed, I am! I'm from Lille and dance in Bruges. Does that surprise you?
Oh dance, oh rapture!
Joy pours out of me, rises inside me, chases my pulse and stretches my nostrils.
The way he waves his hand, the embarrassed foot,
they hide the desire and reveal his lust.
A demon inflames me, controls me, possesses me.
Wild and wilder the dance swells,
ecstasy grips me, bending and bowing.
Hotly my blood circulates, desire begins to burn. Oh dance, oh rapture!
I'm dancing the final blaze, I'm dancing the final kiss of love!
And now, sir, I'm dancing off to the rehearsal.
No, Marietta! Don't leave me.
Make this dream last.
You're a gift from heaven.
Marietta!
How tempestuous! Is it my dancing that has excited you?
Oh dance, oh rapture!
Why, that is me now. The same shawl, the same lute? Who am I supposed to be?
Oh, leave it! She is a dead woman.
She warns...
- ...'Diridi, diridon, beautiful Marion.' - Ah, Gaston.
You have to get to the rehearsal, Marietta.
Oh, I see. He's sending me away!
Yes, I must get to the rehearsal, dear sir,
I'm Helene in 'Robert the Devil'.
My spell, it seems to have worn off fast, a different one is stronger.
Well, that suits me, it's high time, I must go.
Those who love me know how to find me.
There'll be a reunion in the theatre.
Oh dream of return, don't vanish!
Through you, who came, my dead wife came, Marie came...
Marietta!
Marietta!
Paul...
There you are, Marie, I knew it.
Is it really you, are you still faithful to me?
I am. You never faded from this room.
That's why I left the golden treasure when I had to leave.
Left you my hair that you loved so much.
I know.
My hair has not died, it keeps watch in your house.
Our love was, is and will be.
You're with me, always with me, forever.
You're with me in this dead city, you sound in its bells,
rise from its waters.
And yet you forget what doesn't live and breathe next to you.
The other one, the other one, I only see you in her.
Since I'm visible to you, you love me.
I love only you. Tell me that you forgive me.
You do love me.
Our love was, is and will be.
Our love was, is and will be.
Eternal love, why can't I see you anymore?
Why does it feel as if I can't go on?
Life grips you, you're tempted by the other one. Observe and understand.
What's happening to me? Turning around her house,
tormented by fear, desire and remorse.
What's happening to me?
Be silent, somber chorus of bells. Full of darkness the sound plunges into the night.
This is how the bells cried when she was buried.
Now you admonish my conscience.
Oh, absolve me, you confessors made of bronze!
I taste bitter joys, cruelly ambivalent lust.
Was that not a light, a double silhouette?
I always fear that I won't even embrace her in this house.
She was missing in the theatre. If I don't see her, I am gripped by desire for her.
And yet it scares me no less to see her.
Now it begins again, the bells' song, and bores deep into my heart.
Oh, absolve me, you confessors made of bronze!
Does a shudder seize you along with me, tired city?
Your old trees are moaning.
The water's sighs break on the century-old canals.
Eerily, you whisper of disaster.
Bruges, devout city!
Once I was one with your chastity,
just as you were one with my dead wife.
Now I carry the restlessness of desire into the silence and submersion of your night.
- Brigitta! - I'm going to church with the nuns.
That we had to part!
I fled from sin, remained faithful to the deceased.
I, too, did not betray her despite this woman.
My simple mind doesn't understand that. You're suffering greatly, I know.
I will pray for your soul.
The good, loyal maid, alas, that I lost her!
Who is it?
Frank, you?
You're waiting for her here.
I'm waiting for her in pain and shame.
Leave her be.
I can't go on any longer. I was drawn to the soul of my dead wife...
...and I fell for the body of the living.
Leave her be.
What a strange way of saying it.
You were not a good match for her, you, who are torn between death and life.
She wants full love and full life, which she lets stream in...
...through all the windows of her body and her soul.
Of her sinful body and her sinful soul.
And yet, because she is so ardent...
...she elevates life through her beauty's laughter.
The way we soar only in our dreams, she soars when her mind is awake...
...forces us down to her feet as Pierrots.
And Colombine dances and laughs away the sin, intoxicated and...
And she has intoxicated you as well.
Leave her be. Go home to your dead wife.
- I'll wait for her here. - You must not.
I must not? And why not?
Because I'm waiting for her!
What, you?
I have fallen for her, too, and if she betrays you, it shall be with me!
What are you saying?
Get our of my way! Don't you see?
She gave me the key.
Give me that key!
I'm no longer your friend.
Pulse, mad dancer's blood, free of all boundaries.
Dream yourself onto a torrent of water to Venice, to Venice.
And here is the piazetta where she lives, Marietta.
Splendid mise en scène! All hail Victorin!
And all hail the patrons of the arts!
Hail!
Consider.
- No shouting in Bruges. - Police!
She's praying, art is free.
Art is free!
Yes, no glamor without it...
...at a feast and dance, without it, which is divinely insatiable.
Good, loyal, stupid Pierrot.
Oh, moon, hear the sad litany:...
Don't you somehow miss your friend Gaston?
With whom did she cheat on me today?
She and her new lover, oh, they're taking their games too far.
Let's interrupt these lover's games, let's flush them from this murky puddle.
After the water promenade follows a respectful serenade.
Listen, lovely one, listen to the silver tune of the lute.
Your faithful followers, the old and the new, they've been languishing for a long time.
You lead the circle dance to everyone's great enjoyment,
listen to the song!
Come to delight, give yourself to everyone! Listen, lovely one, listen to the lute's tune!
Marietta! Hail!
Where have you been, Marietta?
Didn't feel like rehearsing today, went to the countryside with Gaston.
And him, your friend, the gloomy one?
I got bored. Needed to breathe, after all.
Count Albert, a friend of the arts from Brussels,
invited us for wine and food.
Nice to meet you, count. What else can you do?
Love!
Very good. Just do it rather well! Will there be champagne?
Shall we set the table at my place? But no, out here, that's new.
Art is free.
She's caught him already with a single look. Will you return to us?
Down with Bruges! And down with all lies!
And now, music! A piece that's not too cheerful and not too sad.
Music that sways as in a dance, flying through the moonlit night, softly enticing...
...touching and tempting very quietly.
Pierrot, come! You're what we need. You're a German, you're from the Rhine.
Because your wish is my command, my queen, loyal Pierrot obeys.
'My longing, my fantasy, it dreams its way back here.'
'While dancing I won and I lost my happiness. While dancing by the Rhine in the moonshine...'
'...a heartfelt look from her blue eyes confessed it, her begging word revealed:'
'Oh, stay, oh, don't leave me, preserve my silently blooming happiness.'
'My longing, my fantasy, it dreams its way back here.'
'The magic of afar threw fire into the soul,'
'the magic of the dance lured me, comically.'
'Follow the sweet one, learn to kiss amidst tears.'
'Ecstasy and distress, frenzy and happiness: Oh, that's the trickster's virtuosity.'
'My longing, my fantasy, it dreams its way back here.'
Bravo, dear Pierrot, you may kiss me.
And you, Victorin, take my hand. For you, Count, the other one.
How they come to me when I beckon! And what's left for you?
The neck.
Leave me, fauns! Now I'm getting into the swing of things.
I want to dance, stand in awe, you rabble! I want to dance without a fee.
Lust pours out of me, rushes through me and burns me!
I was missing at the rehearsal today as Helene.
Well, so now I'm going to do my scene in 'Robert the Devil'.
A great idea, I applaud it.
I'll go along! The monastery, the lighting fit splendidly.
I'll fetch the sail as the shroud of the dead.
A great idea, I applaud it!
- You are Robert. - We are the resurrected nuns.
- Gracefully tempting with worldly pleasures. - Here's the sail!
- There hangs the magic branch. - And this bench here shall be the sarcophagus!
Helene lies down on it as a corpse.
And when I whistle the cue from the music, you awaken from death's slumber.
Risen from the dead, you'll seduce Robert, the fool.
I'll make sure it's not lacking in anything! Let's go!
Wait! You, risen from the dead? Never!
It's you. You've come just at the right time! You are the real Robert.
- Wait! - Fool!
- Get away from her! - Hands off this lady!
Leave it, my friends, leave it, my count.
I can deal with him myself.
Go home! Adieu, the party is over.
Enough frolicking. Let calm return. Count, we'll see each other again.
You're making a scene, following me?
You're dishonest and odious.
You throw yourself away without shame.
- You even took away my friend, you were with Frank. - That's not true.
He told me himself, here, I snatched this from him.
Well, since you know about it, what gives you the right to control me? I do as I please.
You, be careful!
- You're grotesque! - You've humiliated me with your lowliness...
- ...betrayed my dream. - So I'll leave, won't keep you.
And you believe, wretched one, that I loved you?
I desired your flesh, your knowing caresses.
I never loved you, I love someone else.
She must have chased you away. Who could stand to be with you?
Be silent or listen to what will devastate you.
Hear my gruesome secret. I kissed a dead woman in you.
Caressed in your hair only that of the other.
Heard in your voice only hers.
When I held you, I felt nothing but her skin, only her warmth, her scent.
I loved her alone, I only loved my dead wife in you.
The picture is of your dead sweetheart?
Don't you dare, don't speak of her.
She was my wife. A saint.
You resemble her strangely, you're her unworthy image.
Do you now understand what you were to me?
A nothing, an empty shadow of my eternal, dear love.
How I hate, how I despise you...
...who tainted my noble sorrow, my pure madness.
I've fallen, fallen low. But now I've found myself again.
I've settled my score, I'm free, I'm redeemed.
We're done with each other.
Paul, you're suffering. Though you've insulted me so wildly,
I pity you. What has happened?
You're exaggerating. I'm sought after. I'm not unattractive, I've got hot blood.
I'm young, I'm cheerful and I love pleasure.
I'm a dancer, part of the world and I need this ecstasy for my art.
What do you want? You ingrate!
Didn't I make you happy? Am I not yours?
My body, whose scent enchanted you so, my hair which you explored with your hand?
Yes. The scent, the hair.
See, you do love me a little bit.
No, I desired you.
- And now you don't want me anymore? - Leave me be.
I've shamefully deconsecrated the memory of my dead wife.
Even though I kept you away from her home, I blasphemed her in your own house.
And what you gave me, what you granted me, it cruelly destroyed my exquisite dream.
You're gloomy, poor friend.
You resemble the black water for which the pale moon rarely shines.
But I, I am caressed by the white ray...
...and the sun is on my side.
Bruges, I've deconsecrated you and her.
And richly blessed by life, I gift you the moon's silver, the sun's gold!
Look at my face that you loved so much.
It's yours! And so are my eyes and my lustful mouth in the hour of passion.
- Your mouth... - Here, take it and drink!
- Who did you kiss in me? - Only you.
- Whose hair did you caress? - Yours, only yours!
- Then come! - To your bed!
No, not to my bed! From now on I want you completely!
I'll visit you in your dead wife's house, to banish her ghost forever!
- I want to come to her bed! For the first time! - Wherever you want to go.
Then come and drink oblivion in sweet ecstasy!
It's you I'm looking for. It's you I have to talk to.
You're pretty and you resemble me, say, do you still resemble me?
Say, where is your power?
You died a second time, proud dead woman, due to me...
...due to me, the night of love of the living!
You, who departed, don't disturb our peace...
...don't push your way into life, let us share our joy alone.
Let us be, we who breathe and live,
we who suffer and strive...
Leave us the fountain, leave us the storms,
the suns and delights...
...leave us the drunken excitement of air and of love!
Oh my sweet savior, one day I will come to you.
In your love's care I will rest so well.
The children. They're gathering for the holy procession...
...and call me away from the dead woman with the word of life.
Once you said: Come to me in the blessed realm...
...to bloom at the edge of heaven, a shining flower.
The singing of the children,
it grows and strengthens life's urge...
You, here?
When I woke up you were gone.
I was compelled to go into the streets, which are steeped in devotion and prayer.
And I was bored without you.
So I went down below to the more interesting floor and visited your dead wife.
Away from here!
Didn't you receive me here yourself, the first time?
- Yes, back then. But today, not here! - No, I'm staying.
We also have a better view of the procession from here.
Come, I implore you!
You deny me the smallest wish. Have you already forgotten what you swore?
The people! That's not Bruges today, the dead city. The people!
How dare you! If someone saw you!
Yet again! Are you still ashamed of me?
Keep hidden, stand to the side, so you're concealed by me.
Now I don't want to see anything!
Be kind, be good.
'My longing, my fantasy, it dreams its way back here.'
'While dancing I won and I lost my happiness.'
'While dancing by the Rhine...'
'...in the moonshine, blue eyes confessed it to me...'
Lovely how he sang that, my Pierrot. Yes, it's burning bright.
- The devout procession. - Leave me in peace.
Keep up your devout masquerade.
How dull! You stay in your box, I'll sing a song.
'Why are you so distant?'
'Haven't kissed you yet today.'
Diridi, diridi, diridon, Gaston, Gaston! To him!
Be silent and stay where you are!
Oh, my sweet savior, we, your little children...
...faithfully and ably accompany your precious, holy blood.
It's the children at the front.
In their glimmering white vestments...
...they surround the Easter lamb.
Come, Marietta, come and see!
A streaming ocean of golden chasubles.
Intoxicating, how the colourful flood undulates.
And beneath a swaying canopy the bishop carries the golden shrine...
...the small bejeweled dome.
Fervor runs through the streets.
The sweet frenzy of holy faith...
...brings everyone to their knees!
...mysterium corporis...
You are devout.
Yes, whoever loves you must share you with the dead and the saints.
But I, listen to me, I want you completely or not at all.
Go, leave the grand pageantry! Come, join me here.
Then I'll be good again. How beautiful you look when you're happy!
Kiss me.
- Not now, not here. - Precisely now, precisely here.
The devout procession, it's invading the room...
...closing in on us, terrible face! Let me be!
You're seeing ghosts. It's this room's mustiness, your dull superstition.
Superstition? No, not superstition!
My faith is loyalty, my faith is eternal love.
And it is holy, this love is holy!
And the first to teach me about love was the one who destroyed me.
I suffered, I quarreled, I dared, won, lost...
...pulled myself up amidst agony and pain, gritted my teeth in defiance.
Wrenched myself from hell's flames...
...struggling, I burst open the locked portal to the garden of joy.
I gained faith in myself.
Should the dead wife rob it from me, should she be allowed to?
She was pure, don't compare yourself to her.
You hypocrite!
Just a few hours ago
you worshipped my depravity and didn't think about her purity.
And if I want, you'll lie at my feet again.
- Yes, me, who you're chiding as impure. - Wicked one, be silent, leave.
You crave the power of reviled desires,
moan for a wildly frenzied night of love...
...and you will share me with the Pierrots, with your friend...
- ...and anyone I like who comes along! - Wretched woman, go away!
- No! - Leave this sacred room!
To yield to her? Never!
I'll fight her! And with open eyes, woman to woman, hotly breathing life against death!
Am I not beautiful and doesn't my art make me strong?
And doesn't it elevate me above the pale likeness of what was?
Stop it and leave!
Where's her magic in this dull room full of junk?
I will destroy it, I swear it, I swear it.
- Oh, what's that? - Don't touch it! That's sacred!
Her hair?
Indeed, her hair!
Indeed, her hair!
...dead and without luster.
Isn't mine silkier, softer?
Be careful! My sanctuary, don't defile it!
This thing a sanctuary? You're fantasizing.
Give it to me, the hair, it keeps watch and threatens.
You're giving it to me, right?
The hair, the golden treasure that she left me...
...it keeps watch in my house, it keeps watch and seeks vengeance.
Be careful!
I'm dancing, I'm dancing the last fervor of love, the last kiss.
Give it to me or die!
Now she resembles her completely. Marie!
Where is the dead woman? Wasn't she lying here, distorted, her eyes closed?
And here's the hair, untouched, it shines like before.
What happened? What did I experience? No, what did I see?
The lady from before, Mister Paul, she turned around at the corner.
Brigitta, you, with old affection and devotion?
Here I am again, so shortly after leaving you.
I forgot the umbrella and my roses.
It could be seen as an omen, a sign that I should stay.
So that was the miracle?
It was the miracle, I can read in your eyes that it is no more.
Oh, friend, I won't see her again.
A dream has destroyed my dream.
A dream of bitter reality has destroyed the dream of fantasy.
The dead send such dreams if we live too much with and inside them.
How far should our grief go, how far should it be allowed to go without uprooting us?
Painful conundrum of feelings.
I'm leaving again.
Say, do you want to join me?
To leave the city of death?
I will try.
Happiness that was left to me, farewell, my faithful love.
Life separates us from death's cruel power.
Wait for me in the sky, there can be no resurrection here.
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