Deroo, Florian2025-08-072025-08-072025-07-0397816857119249781685711931f329927d-9e1f-4647-b95f-5ab2c3d33df2https://doi.org/10.53288/0480.1.00https://thoth-arch.lib.cam.ac.uk/handle/1811/893Publication status: ACTIVEWaves washing up against the hull, a bed and a small stove, the deck hatch sealed shut — the vessel is the ultimate dwelling. How to live together in cramped quarters? How to create a microcosm against hostile surroundings? In Barge Life, Florian Deroo tackles these question by looking at a mythical classic of French cinema: Jean Vigo’s 1934 film L’Atalante. A work brimming with the energies of surrealism and anarchism, L’Atalante follows a young couple, two shipmates, and a clowder of cats who dwell in the belly of a river barge. Deroo offers a wide-ranging essay on the film, revealing how it invokes a small group that withdraws from the rhythm of modern life to establish a different kind of existence elsewhere. In L’Atalante’s most riveting moments, the river barge becomes a vehicle for a powerful fantasy: a flexible collective life, lived in sensuous interdependence. Combining film criticism, philosophy, and biography, this book reconsiders a forerunner of the French New Wave and the early death of its director. Drawing readers into the living spaces of L’Atalante, Deroo explores the allure of retreating into a self-sufficient shelter, along with its intractable problems.Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Internationalhttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ART057000PHI0010001DDF3MPBGJ6NWATFAfantasyfilm criticismfilm studiesFrench cinemaJean Vigonouvelle vagueRoland Barthesspacehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_2f332025-08-07