My favorite of the four was The Colonel’s Lady, in which a middle-aged wife of a prominent businessman publishes a book of poems describing a middle-age woman’s affair with a young man and his subsequent death, leaving her in her passionless marriage. The film follows her husband as he journeys into London, meeting his friends and mistress, and each person he runs into discusses his wife’s book and suggests that it’s racy, sensual, and fantastic. Rather than sitting down and reading it, he eventually begs his mistress to summarize the narrative, and he finds out the poetry describes an affair. Enraged at the thought of his wife having an affair, he sets out to learn the name of his wife’s paramour (thanks Brandon).

The narrative produces two reactions: first, the husband judges his wife’s potential indiscretion harshly without thinking about his own mistress upon whom he showers attention. The second reaction is about love: how love changes and how we long for what was, but accept what is. The wife’s position should be sad, but somehow her celebration of their memories saves her from being a pathetic female character and shows how strong she is.

The other shorts had nothing on this one.