Romance

I purchased this DVD with an opened mind and after watching it I believe that woman could be one of a million women walking the streets today... And the detail during the birth was WOW!! She was a mild-mannered tramp with a sexy disposition...

A psychological study into Bondage that is well done, interesting and not too scary!! Well written and preformed.

Una pieza sublime, sensible y retrospectivo del cine francés. Con una dosis de erotismo, sin dejar al conciente la capacidad de mostrar lo explicito. Pero también sus imágenes bien montadas y logradas nos permite reflexionar sobre la eterna levedad del ser. Pero ahora desde la visión psicológica femenina por encontrar el amor, el placer, sus estímulos, sus excesos, sus tormentos. Comparable solo con un monólogo. No dejarás de formularte preguntas, pensar y sentir empatía por Marie (Caroline Ducey). Infaltable en tu videoteca. Y si eres un neófito cinéfilo esta es una muestra genial del cine francés.

The Bottom Line:

Romance is unfortunately notable only for its graphic sex, for Breillat has not come up with a compelling story to go along with the taboo-shattering scenes; if you want to see the provocative French director use her skills to a point and purpose, watch Fat Girl instead.

Is Marie (Caroline Ducey) perverted because she wants to be used and abused, or is it her boyfriend Paul (Sagamore Stévenin) who is perverted because he denies her the love she craves because of his need to control? Or is it Robert (François Berléand) who has spent a lifetime chasing and seducing women? Or is it director Catherine Breillat herself who in France is sometimes known as a "porno auteuriste"?


Or, better yet, is it the debased mind of the censor, the prude and the hypocrite who would deny the range of human sexuality?

From Breillat's point of view, it is the censors who create the concept of obscenity.

I have to say however that some movies are so graphically sexual that it is difficult to watch them without being aroused, and this is such a movie, the most pornographic movie that I have ever seen that was not pornography per se.

Candor about sexuality is not what most people want. Even rarer is it for a woman to be candid about her sexuality in a forum that might include men. The fact that Catherine Breillat directed this film does not mean in any way that the sexuality of the central character is Breillat's sexuality, but it does mean she understands that sexuality; and since it is presented in a sympathetic manner, it means that she believes it is true at least for some women, at least some of the time.

In effect the movie asks the politically incorrect question, do women want to be used and abused? Breillat's cinematic answer is a bit of equivocation. I think what she is saying is, it depends. For even asking such questions Breillat has experienced hatred and been denied funding. But she says "All true artists are hated. Only conformists are ever adored."

Marie's boyfriend who is pretty and very attractive to most women will not have sex with her. Not completely. He frustrates her for no apparent reason. He seems almost pathological in his disinterest in her. She feels not just rejected but inadequate and of course frustrated. She is crazy about him and does everything she can to interest him, but to no avail. A game begins: but we see only her side of the game. His side is hardly present, but there is this blond-haired male friend that he likes to hang out with. Perhaps Paul is gay and doesn't know it or doesn't want to admit it.

Marie first tries a guy in a bar. It doesn't work out because there is no feeling on her part aside from...aside from what? From a desire to hurt Paul? To prove to herself that she is attractive? Then there is Robert the older man who claims to have had sex with 10,000 women although he is anything but handsome. This reminds me of the French novelist Georges Simenon who made the same claim in much the same way. Incidentally 10,000 women is approximately one a day for thirty years, which (pre Viagra) is sometimes thought of as the length of a man's sexually active life. Some readers may recall these lines from the poem "Go and Catch a Falling Star" by John Donne:

"Ride ten thousand days and nights,
Till age snow white hairs on thee,
Thou, when thou return'st, wilt tell me,
All strange wonders that befell thee,
And swear,
No where
Lives a woman true, and fair."

Or the reader may be reminded of the "ten thousand things" from the East. In other words, ten thousand is a number that means "many," but many in a very human way.

At any rate, this man Robert is past the time in his life when he can, shall we say, perform. But he knows women and he discerns Marie's desires which are to be taken completely. He ties her up and she finds that she likes it, etc.

Well, what's the resolution? How should this end? Should Paul wake up and really love her? Or will she finally get completely disgusted with him and leave? Or will he wake up and then be found boring. Is that what he is afraid of?

The way Breillat chooses to end the film is both a bit too easy and yet seems apt. Notice that the title "Romance" is a kind of sardonic take on the "pornography" of romance novels. Romance novels fulfill the wishes of the feminine reader but in a euphemistic and unspecific way. The "hard" sex that Breillat presents (in a mostly soft way) in this film is only hinted at in romance novels.

On the other hand, clearly in keeping with a good ending from a woman's point of view (in so far as a "good" ending is possible in this film) is the fact that Marie ends up with what in evolutionary psychology is called having her cake and eating it too. She receives superior genes (or at least very attractive genes) for reproduction while winning the support of the man who will take care of her and her child. In this case these are two different men. Guess which one is which.

Be forewarned that this is a MOST explicit film sexually speaking and will offend many viewers.

One final question: did she have to kill the cat?