Billy Wilder’s dark comedy, “Sunset Boulevard” is at the heart of Hollywood and its film industry. Told from the point of view of a screenwriter, the movie makes use of the noir genre to create a strange tale about the “return” of an old silent movie star (played by Gloria Swanson). Wilder is sumptuous in his portrayal of this ostentatious decadence: Norma Desmond, this old star, lives alone with her butler in a Faustian mansion. The thread of illusions and fantasies of the glory that cinema can provide turn “Sunset Boulevard” into an allegory of the transience of time and of the ways aging can explain the relentless quest for the “new”. With cameos by Hollywood greats such as Cecil B. de Mille and actor/filmmaker Buster Keaton, the movie plays into an intricate web of relations while recreating a long-lost aura. It is a comical, but at the same time profoundly sad, film. (DR)