Sunday, October 9, 2011

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)
Romance (1999)


Genre: Drama
Director: Catherine Breillat
Starring:  Caroline Ducey, Rocco Siffredi, François Berléand, Sagamore Stévenin
Language: French
Duration: 99 min.
Rating: 6.0  

Summary:
Marie is unfulfilled by her relationship with Paul, her narcissistic male model boyfriend who refuses to show her any kind of physical affection, much less make love to her. Frustrated, she decides to take matters into her own hands, and search for intimacy beyond the bounds of traditional sexual limitations, a journey that proves to be both fulfilling and empowering.

Romance (1999)


Romance is a controversial film written and directed by Catherine Breillat.  It is known mostly for the casting of porn actor Rocco Siffredi, and for scenes of explicit unsimulated sex.

It is the story of Marie (Caroline Ducey) stuck in a passionless relationship with Paul (Sagamore Stévenin) who goes on a quest of sexual enlightenment.  Despite the nudity and graphic scenes, the situations aren't very erotic.  All throughout we hear Marie's thoughts to herself as she willingly goes from one encounter to the next, analyzing and philosophizing about her individual role and feelings as she acts out her fantasies.

As a story this one isn't very well executed, in fact it's very boring, made worse by having characters that are very difficult to care about.  However Breillat does provide some fascinating insight into the female psyche, and she definitely has a way for getting fantastic performances from actors in unconventional situations.  Ducey's brave performance in particular conveys a wide range of emotions very realistically.  Other than that, there's nothing here to recommend.

Bonjour Tristesse

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)

Romance (1999)

10 comments:

Bonjour Tristesse said...

They really aren't very shocking and definitely cannot be considered porn.  I do respect Breillat for consistently pushing the boundaries in film.  It's just she isn't a great storyteller here, so if you can't relate to her characters it's a difficult film to appreciate.

Michaël Parent said...

Finally, it's interesting to read a review of this film that not only talks about how choking is the unsimulated sex scenes! I'm curious to see this one even if it's not a very good movie!

Bonjour Tristesse said...

Cool, email sent!

Bonjour Tristesse said...

No it sure isn't an easy film to like.  Thanks for stopping by James.

Hoi-Ming Ng said...

Shame. It seemed so.... "promising" haha.

Shutterbug said...

And also, you are the top scorer for the month of September! Congrats! Will you please send me an email to thingamajigblog at gmail.com to claim your prize! It's going to be good... ;)

d_4 said...

Not exactly a family film. Eh. I dunno about it. I think I'd rather dedicate time to other films.

Shutterbug said...

It has to be good!  It's a French movie and  the French know a thing or two about romance!

The Reel Foto said...

might check this out. :D

James R. said...

I really couldn't stand this film. For me, the only thing it has going for it is that it's not as bad as Breillat's later Anatomy of Hell, which could be the worst film I've ever seen.

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