Belle de Jour
Wednesday, 10 Jan 2007 20:45
Denevue and Clementi in Belle de Jour
Directed by Luis Bunuel, limited re-release from December 29th at the National Film Theatre, starring Catherine Deneuve, Jean Sorel, Genevieve Page, Pierre Clementi, running time 100 mins.
In a nutshell…
Mesmerizing. Mystifying. Luscious. Measured. Essential.
What's it all about?
Demure and sheltered young bride Severine (Deneuve) is tentative at best in the bedroom. On the eve of their first wedding anniversary, she hesitantly confides to her husband that she would like to kiss him – but intimacy terrifies her.
Yet when she closes her eyes, graphic and elaborate fantasies of flagellation and abasement career through Severine's subconscious, exposing an unsatisfied hunger for humiliation. After she hears tell of a high-class brothel in town, she detaches from her rarefied social circle and gravitates irresistibly towards Madame Anais' establishment.
There, she reinvents herself as 'Belle de Jour', role-playing masochistic rituals with clients. She scrupulously confines her gratification to the hours of two till five each afternoon, but her meticulously partitioned double life dissolves when she meets the devastatingly magnetic Marcel. The impetuous young criminal becomes consumed with the desire to get at the real woman beneath Belle's daytime persona. Cue complications.
Who's in it?
Iconic French actress Catherine Deneuve twins aloofness with allure as the exquisite and self-possessed Severine. She keeps the audience breathlessly alert to the slightest shift in her icily arch features and light, deliberate movements.
By her side, Jean Sorel recalls Omar Sharif's Doctor Zhivago as Severine's husband Pierre – dependable, capable, and too affable by half.
Pierre Clementi's Marcel, on the other hand, is a ravishingly nasty piece of work with a tremulously cruel mouth and a smile crammed with metal. Clementi's acutely observed and explosive mixture of lost-boy loneliness and juvenile vehemence forces the story to its climax.
As an example…
"La double vie, comme c'est interessant"
Likelihood of a trip to the Oscars
Belle de Jour deserves a wider audience than the NFT regulars. It yields up its mysteries confidingly, placidly outshining more self-regarding or self-referential offerings. And when the credits roll, you want to puzzle things through with Bunuel rather than tie him to a chair and force him to explain himself.
What the others say
"Subtle, gripping and a masterpiece of cinema" – Fran Hortop, Channel 4.com
"The details in Belle de Jour are rule-breakingly brilliant… a must-see." – Rob Mackie, The Guardian
So is it any good?
Belle de Jour compels the viewer to watch attentively. Director Bunuel uncoils his intriguing premise at a masterfully controlled pace complemented by nuanced, self-contained performances which do justice to the film's moral ambivalence.
The camera explores Severine's physicality through her long awakening with the non-judgemental curiosity of a child, and her half-sunk memories, brutal fantasies, and present reality are intercut without any ostentatious technique helping us differentiate between them, disorientating us until we gradually, tentatively find our way alone.
Bunuel keeps his audience distant and uncertain; he refuses to hold our hand. Is Severine's choice an indictment of childhood trauma or a legitimate liberation? Is the reappearance of the ominous fairytale horse and carriage a signal of hope or despair, circularity or escape? Bunuel trusts his audience too implicitly to signpost simple motivations, motifs, or moral boundaries. This is a contained, challenging, and truly adult film.
8/10
Sophie Middlemiss
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