Film Review
The Larrieu brothers' follow-up to their gloriously unhinged
apocalyptic fantasy
Les Derniers jours du monde
(2009) finds them back on more familiar ground, that of the classic
French polar, but it still manages to be an unsettling mélange
of genres, a twisted potpourri of dark amorous intrigue, lowgrade
erotica, suspense thriller and black comedy.
L'Amour est un crime parfait
(a.k.a.
Love Is the Perfect Crime)
is closely based on the 2010 novel Incidences by Philippe Djian, whose
best-known work,
37°2 le matin a été,
was adapted for cinema by Jean-Jacques Beineix way back in 1986.
The film's title is an obvious nod to Hitchcock's famous quote "Film
your murders like love scenes, and film your love scenes like
murders." In their fifth and most accessible film to date this is
precisely what the Larrieus attempt to do - with decidedly mixed
results.
As in pretty well all of their previous films, Arnaud and Jean-Marie
Larrieu impress far more with the quality of their direction than with
their screenwriting. Crafted with ingenuity and elegance,
L'Amour est un crime parfait has an
alluring cold beauty about it that is in perfect harmony with its
sordid subject matter, but it is a beauty that deceives, a
trompe-l'oeil to divert our attention from the lack of substance behind
it. The film may be an overt homage to Hitchcock but
aesthetically it owes more to Hitchcock's French spiritual brother,
Claude Chabrol. If there is one unifying principle to Chabrol's
work it is that we should never take things at face value. There
is always far more beneath the surface than we imagine.
Paradoxically, the Larrieus invert this Chabrolian mantra and give us a
film in which there seems to be nothing but an aching void beneath the
surface. Their art consists of little more than a clever
conjuring trick, convincing us that we see far more than there actually
is. With a less distinguished and less committed cast we would
most probably have seen through the illusion straight away.
In his fourth collaboration with the Larrieus, Mathieu Amalric once
again brings gravitas to a film that badly needs it. His creepily
ambiguous portrayal of an oversexed university professor with a Jekyll
and Hyde personality provides the film with enough substance to make it
worth watching, although it is the more subtle performances from
co-stars Maïwenn and Karin Viard that provide the darker, more
disturbing insights into human nature. Whilst the protagonists
are convincingly played, the lack of character depth soon becomes
apparent and ultimately dents the film's credibility, exposing the
Heath Robinson job that the film's authors have done on its plot.
L'Amour est un crime parfait
works only so long as the spectator is prepared to suspend his or her
disbelief. Like any conjuring trick, once you have seen through
the illusion the film's charm evaporates in an instant.
© James Travers 2014
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Marc may be an enthusiastic literature professor, but he is also an inveterate
skirt-chaser, and his habit of taking his female students to bed often brings
him into conflict with Richard, his departmental head at Lausanne University.
The fact that Richard is amorously involved with Marc's sister Marianne doesn't
exactly help their strained relationship. Richard's warnings that Marc's
over-active libido will one day get him into trouble prove to be justified.
Waking up one morning in the alpine chalet that he shares with his sister,
Marc is surprised to find his latest amorous conquest, an attractive student
named Barbara, lying dead in his bed. He has no recollection of the
night before, so he is at a complete loss to explain the girl's presence
in his chalet.
Realising that he is potentially in very deep water, Marc naturally denies
any knowledge of Barbara's disappearance when the police come to question
him. He keeps his secret to himself, and refuses to divulge anything
to either Marianne or Richard. Then he comes up against Anna, the stepmother
of the dead girl, who is clearly anxious about Barbara's unexplained absence
and is pursuing her own investigation into her disappearance. Despite
his concerns that he may be blamed for his lover's death, Marc finds himself
powerfully drawn to Anna and is soon up to his usual amorous tricks.
Little does he know that the enigmatic woman is not quite what she pretends
to be...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.