In the film le feu follet (The fire within, 1963), the main character, Alain Leroy, played by Maurice Ronet, regularly contemplates the date July 23 written across his mirror. This date imprints itself as an image. It also recalls the film Cléo de 5 à 7 (Cléo from 5 to 7, 1962) by Agnès Varda, where the time frame is even more constrained – a study of the objective elapsing and subjective experience between five and seven o’clock. The two films are united by the theme of imminent death.
