On the coast of France, an elderly woman muses upon a warped childhood escapade: meeting a girl by an abandoned chateau and together being transported to New York—where, suddenly grown-up and separated, they search for one another on every bridge, rooftop, and burnished pier.

A kind of goth little sister to Jacques Rivette’s crazed fable of doubles and dreams Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974), Jean Rollin’s made-for-TV mini-feature is a postmodern classic of slippery, existential lyricism, aglow with mysterious flâneuses, purpled cityscapes, and sultry synths.

An artisan of sincere perversions and silk-draped vampires, Rollin has described Lost in New York as “an anthology of all the themes and obsessive images I have used in my films.” For one, it heavily features his so-called “fetish beach”—a deserted Dieppe seascape spiked with jagged pyres, which haunted Rollin since childhood—in irresistibly dusky 16mm.

Swapping out grainy gore and blood-slicked erotica for more indiscernible terrors and pleasures, however, this hallucinatory romp sees the poet maudit-cum-pornographer’s fascinations explode into something wholly melodic and mystical, much akin to a dance.

“After Perdues dans New York, I said that my films would never be the same ..." - Jean Rollin

Preceded by SECRET FILM: One of the gentler experiments by a chimeric provocateur of the Japanese avant-garde. In this playfully melancholic, sun-bleached reverie, a troupe of dandy-esque mimes wander turquoise streets and shores, welcoming us into infinite unknown worlds.

Country: FRANCE + ???
Year: 1989 + ???
Language: FRENCH + ???