Details

There’s something melancholy about this segment of the film, but maybe that’s just me. It begins with her in music class, and for a group of young children, they sure seem to be doing a wonderful job with Van den Budenmayer. Except Veronique doesn’t like what she’s hearing from a girl named Nicole playing the cello. She tells her that she’s playing out of key and Nicole agrees. Veronique, clearly distracted and holding her audio tape, tells the musicians to start again, barely giving them a count in cue to begin. She’s not much of a conductor. Then she stares out the window and sees yet another elderly woman, walking with a cane. This one doesn’t seem to be struggling with a task, she’s just walking along. But then Veronique yells “Nicole! Stop!”

After Veronique’s rapid progress in solving Alexandre’s mysteries by text, now she must focus on an audio tape that he’s sent her. It feels like she exists in a private romantic escape room. Except the audio clues are more difficult — we know that it all takes place at a train station, but which one?

Time for another digression — train stations play a prominent role in many Kieslowski films. His film “Blind Faith” offers three different outcomes based on whether the main character catches a train. But Kieslowski said that he disliked filming in train stations and didn’t have a special affection for trains either.

Returning to the tape, Veronique seems to take up much of the day listening and re-listening to the details and appears to be struggling with it. Or maybe I’m projecting my own difficulty distinguishing the audio details, it’s not one of my strengths. Part of the problem is that the soundtrack intervenes at times in the scenes as well, so I don’t know if Veronique is hearing the music or just the audience. She eventually has an intuition to get her magnifying glass and she starts to examine in the tape, but then has another idea.

This leads her to drive over to her father’s house in the middle of the night, moving quietly not to wake him, then fetching the envelope that enclosed the tape. Using the magnifying glass, she sees a postmark from St. Lazare. Gare Saint-Lazare is a train station situated in the 8th arrondissement. The station has been painted many times, including by Claude Monet, who lived nearby.

Not a great deal happens in this part of the film, heightening the suspense a bit. But it’s also becoming increasingly apparent that Alexandre is playing a very complicated, elaborate game with Veronique that borders on manipulation. I admire the way she jumps into this intellectual puzzle — which is clearly part of the appeal to her. But as she begins to draw nearer to him, you have to wonder why he is making her work so hard.