Love Affair, or the Case of the Missing Switchboard Operator

Throughout film history, the links between progress and the telephone—and between the telephone and women—have been recurring themes. In Italy, the comedic telefoni bianchi subgenre reinforced gender stereotypes and conservative values for over a decade. Love Affair, by contrast, stands out for its avant-garde form and its provocatively modern female lead. The second feature by Dušan Makavejev, a key figure of the Yugoslav Black Wave, transforms a tragic romance between a young switchboard operator (Eva Ras) and a pest control worker (Slobodan Aligrudić) into a bold and radical work of cinema, widely regarded as one of the defining films of the 1960s.