Fire Within, the (Le Feu Follet) (DVD)

After garnering international acclaim for such seminal crowd-pleasers as "The Lovers" and "Zazie dans le metro," Louis Malle gave his fans a shock with "The Fire Within" (Le feu follet), a penetrating study of individual and social inertia. Maurice Ronet (Elevator to the Gallows), in an implosive, haunted performance, plays Alain Leroy, a self-destructive writer who resolves to kill himself and spends the next twenty-four hours trying to reconnect with a host of wayward friends. Unsparing in its portrait of Alain’s inner turmoil and shot with remarkable clarity, "The Fire Within" is one of Malle's darkest and most personal films.