Just saw this and it blew me away. I haven't seen the 1915 Les Vampires serial that inspired this, but this film already gave me a deep appreciation for the original and I can't wait to check it out.

More than that though, this movie is about making movies... or specifically re making movies. In this (autobiographical?) story, the fictional director René treads the line of a nervous breakdown as he flirts with the arrogance of remaking a classic, the humility of realizing it can't be done, and the inspiration of a muse who makes him think maybe it's possible.

Aint that the story of the human condition?

Meanwhile, surrounding & suffocating him, is the absurd drama between cast & crew. From the costume lady up to the DP, they're all bombarding the production with their own drama threatening to tear down the production for no good reason. Add to the mix a snarky rival director who's salivating at the prospect of stealing the glory. But what makes this movie great is that it doesn't focus on René--in fact he's only in 2 or 3 scenes. The protagonist is Maggie, the lead actress, who enters the story as a curious observer. (One of the best entrances... an amazing 2 min tracking shot that immerses us in 360 degrees of chaos which Maggie walks into, finally giving the camera stability.) Gradually she gets drawn into the director's madness as well as the crew's drama. It's through Maggie that we feel the conflict of the fictional director as well as the real one Olivier Assayas.

This movie can be really confusing on first watch, especially with the cryptic acid-trippy ending (2001 A Space Odyssey, anyone?) but even if we don't understand exactly what the director is saying, which may be the point, we never lose sight of what's happening.

I've seen a lot of great movies about the plagues of a filmmaker, stuff like Wim Wenders' Lisbon Story (still my top) and Jonze/Kaufman's mindbending Adaptation and Kaufman's even more mindbending Synecdoche NY... I'm not sure where this fits in the list but it definitely rockets to the top 5.