Love Is the Perfect Crime (2013)
Marc, in his 40s, is a professor of literature at the University of Lausanne. Still a bachelor — and still living with his sister Marianne in a huge, isolated chalet that they inherited when they were very young — he carries on one love affair after another with his students. Winter has almost ended when one of his most brilliant students, Barbara, suddenly disappears. Two days later, Marc meets Barbara’s mother, Anna, who wants to find out more about her vanished daughter.
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Brilliant and touching
what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.
There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.
Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable
This is my third Larrieu brothers film. I like their work because they have found a way to work within the film industry that does not involve the streets and houses of Paris (however beautiful these streets and houses may be). The peace and quietude of the Pyrenees are their environment, and the source of the pleasure these films bring me.The acting by Amalric, Viard, Maiwenn and Forestier is strong. The occasional unlikely development in the script doesn't bother me because the actors are on target all the time. How about Forestier as the nightmare co-ed of the decade, if not of all time? And Karin Viard whose neurotic sister is very well drawn. Amalric always impresses me, he's really the strongest actor in France now. Only trouble: 10-15 minutes could easily have been cut to make a tighter story.
When I see the names Mattiau Amalric, Karin Viard, and Maiwenn as principal players in a film I've never heard of (and which turns out to be two years old) I'm happy to trust in what I know of them based on films in which I have seen them and which I have enjoyed and all three have a decent backlog with in the case of Maiwenn and Amalric director as well as acting credits on their respective CVs. Throw in Denis Podalydes and you have a formidable quartet so it's pity that all four chose to squander their talents in a piece of glossy fluff that does credit to no one involved. Essentially we're talking third-rate Chabrol in a highly scenic setting which is all it really has going for it. In a nutshell Amalric is a latter-day History Man, teaching creative writing as a Major with a Minor is Sex Education with his nubile female students, one of whom disappears following a liaison with him in the first reel cue the girl's 'stepmother' an undercover cop happy to sleep with Amalric to get a conviction and cause ripples in his incestuous relationship with his live-in sister Karin Viard. The whole thing is a terrible mish-mosj but the scenery is good and the actors better than this trash deserves.
A more than decent attempt at a thriller mystery. Our main actor might not be the most likable person (far from it), but that doesn't mean we have to hate him. Actually the actor (very well known in France) does a great job showing more than one side on him. And even if you can see where this is going (or what actually happened), this ride is well worth going along with.It might be a bit too long and the relationships are stretched a bit (though never feel fake or false, no pun intended), but the overall message is delivered. Great photography, with a very slow moving pace, that might not be everyones taste.
Three quarters of the way through the film, I decided that everyone had misunderstood it and the filmmakers had their tongues firmly in their collective cheek. And therein lies the problem. I was wrong, as a late twist reveals. This film wants to be taken seriously. That tonal inconsistency is a deal breaker. Matthieu Almeric is miscast and everyone else, even the wonderful Sarah Forestier, for the most part wasted. Only Maiwen gets to have some fun with her character. For most of its running time it plays like a very subtle comedy, a kind of "Scream XX" for the psychological thriller genre, with a cast of characters straight out of a cheap melodrama. The philandering professor, his incestuous sister, the endless nubile students and the drop-dead gorgeous bereaved mother. Phillipe Djian, who wrote the novel on which this screenplay is based, also wrote Betty Blue, the novel. That's relevant because Betty Blue the movie is a lot better than Betty Blue the novel. The novel reads like a bad teenage fantasy. That film is in most ways true to the book but it succeeds because it sets the right tone from the start and is perfectly cast. Love is the Perfect Crime has neither advantage, the director simply not understanding the subject matter. I read recently that Paul Verhoeven is planning to adapt a Djian novel. Now that might be worth seeing.