The Ring Finger

The Ring Finger is a French film based on a story by the Japanese novelist Yoko Ogawa. It is an extremely complex surrealist-type film that will require many hours of thought long after the film ends. I am even considering watching The Ring Finger again. It stars the very beautiful Ukrainian-born actress Olga Kurylenko who I just saw in the movie In the Wonder.

Now I will attempt to give you an idea of the complexity of this film. 

The film follows a lonely young lady, Iris (Olga Kurylenko). In the first scene we see her working on an assembly line in a bottling factory at a major seaport. She doesn't see a broken bottle and badly cuts her ring finger.

We next see Iris renting a room at a seaport hotel for sailors and then taking a job as a receptionist in a bizarre laboratory where she assists with the screening of people who wish to preserve things of value. The pale-faced laboratory owner (Marc Barbe) is authoritative, austere, and abrupt. The office is in an old building with lots of rooms and was once a girl's school.  The "specimens" are preserved in many of the rooms of this building.

As time passes, the owner becomes interested in Iris, then attentive, and finally possessive. Iris allows herself to succumb to his wishes and becomes his lover. This confirms the depth of her deprived emotional needs. Incidentally, as part of their "contract" he insists that she wears a pair of high-heeled red shoes--always.

What you now know only sets the scene of this movie.  Over the course of the movie you see a young sailor who shares the hotel room where she lives. He is there during the day and she is there during the night. We also meet an old rasta client who works as a shoe shiner. He is impressed with Iris's red shoes, but warns her that the red shoes are cursed, and she should not wear them too often. Additionally Iris finds that two older women live in the building. One is the former switchboard operator of the girls school who casually mentions to Iris that her predecessors in her job suddenly disappeared without a word. Also throughout the movie a young boy stares at her through windows. Who is he and why is he there?

One scene near the end of the movie has great meaning but it escapes me. After returning to the lab she accidentally drops a client's mahjong set, and, on the director's instruction, spends the rest of the night slowly picking up the pieces and reassembling them in their rightful place. Accepting her fate, she takes off the shoes, and walks into the basement where only specimens are permitted. I will not say what then happens. I have no idea what it means. 

As you can see this is an interesting and complex movie. I highly recommend this movie if you are intellectual who will attempt to understand a surreal movie.