Barbican Cinema introduction: Our ‘alternative’ Valentine’s offering, this final film by director Henri-Georges Clouzot (Les Diaboliques) takes us into a kinky love triangle set in the Paris art world of the Swinging Sixties. Josée is a confident, liberated modern woman with a
career as a film editor and an ‘open’ marriage to kinetic sculptor
Gilbert. After an exhibition opening she goes home with the gallery
owner, Stan, where a disturbing Hans Bellmer nude takes pride of place,
and a coco de mer sits provocatively on the coffee table. He’s showing her some photos when, oops, up pops an image of a naked
woman, bound in chains. Josée is both intrigued and repelled by what
Stan tells her of his predilections, and of his sessions photographing
women in S&M poses. Will she decide to be the next? In the course of the film Josée makes discoveries about her sexuality
she struggles to come to terms with. Is Stan right that there is a deep
strain of perversity in us all? And… what’s love got to do with it?
We’re delighted to welcome critic Virginie Sélavy to unpick this film’s tangled tale of love, voyeurism and domination/submission.
Here (and above) is the trailer.
Here (and above) is the trailer.
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