Le Journal du séducteur (1996) - film review

A young student, Claire, falls obsessively in love with a another student, Gregoire after having read his copy of Kierkegaard’s novel, Le Journal du séducteur.  The book apparently is cursed, having the effect of causing anyone who reads it to fall in love with the person who leant it.   Whilst Claire is occupied with Gregoire, she is pursued by another young man, Sebastien, who believes he can win her love by appearing to seduce her mother.  Naturally, Claire is unimpressed.   Despite their mutual attraction, Claire finds Gregoire strangely elusive, but she soon discovers his secret, wrapped up in a fridge freezer in his kitchen...

Le Journal du séducteur is a curious, but not entirely satisfying, pot-pourri of conventional French romantic drama and black surrealist comedy.  It begins as what appears to be a conventional light romantic comedy, but, as the film progresses, it becomes darker and more bizarre and at one point starts to resemble a suspense thriller.   Whilst the film lacks depth and the plot is unnecessarily convoluted, it manages to hold the spectator’s interest, if only because it is so unusual and fiendishly unpredictable.

The film’s strongest selling point is probably the quality of the acting performances. Chiara Mastroianni and Melvil Poupaud are impressive, bringing a dark intensity to the drama, which is sadly wasted on such a mediocre film.  Particularly memorable are the outrageously eccentric performances from two stalwarts of French cinema, Jean-Pierre Léaud and Micheline Presle.  Léaud looks as if he has just absconded from a lunatic asylum, whilst Presle gives a wondrously hammed up performance (which the script can just about accommodate).

© James Travers 2002

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