Muriel (film)

Muriel
Directed by	Alain Resnais
Written by	Jean Cayrol
Produced by	Anatole Dauman
Starring	Delphine Seyrig Jean-Pierre Kérien Jean-Baptiste Thiérrée Nita Klein
Cinematography	Sacha Vierny
Edited by	Kenout Peltier Eric Pluet
Music by	Hans Werner Henze
Distributed by	Argos Films
Release date	24 July 1963 (1963-07-24)
Running time	115 minutes
Country	France / Italy
Language	French

Muriel (French: Muriel ou le Temps d'un retour, literally Muriel, or the Time of a Return) is a 1963 French psychological drama film directed by Alain Resnais, and starring Delphine Seyrig, Jean-Pierre Kérien, Jean-Baptiste Thiérrée, and Nita Klein. Its plot follows a middle-aged widow in Boulogne-sur-Mer and her stepson—recently returned from military service in the Algerian War—who are visited by her ex-lover and his new young girlfriend.

It was Resnais's third feature film, following Hiroshima mon amour (1959) and Last Year at Marienbad (1961), and in common with those films it explores the challenge of integrating a remembered or imagined past with the life of the present. It also makes oblique reference to the controversial subject of the Algerian War, which had recently been brought to an end. Muriel was Resnais's second collaboration with Jean Cayrol, who had also written the screenplay of Night and Fog (1956).