Buy at AllPosters.com

Genre: Drama

Director: Luis Bunuel

Writing Credits: Luis Brunuel, Jean-Claude Carriere.  Joseph Kessel (Novel)

Certificate: Ireland: 18s

Séverine Serizy (Deneuve) is 23, extremely attractive, classy, and newly wed to Pierre (Sorel), a young, well off surgeon with a promising career.  They live in an elegant apartment in Paris, have a perfect middle-class life – skiing holidays, designer clothes, a maid – and they love each other.  But from Séverine’s vivid and tormented dreams, we learn that there’s something wrong with her sexuality, something that deeply affects her emotional balance and her marriage.

At the end of one of her many shopping days, Séverine is told by her best friend, Renee (Méril), that a common acquaintance leads a double life: in the eyes of the world she is a respectable married lady, but she (not so) secretly works as a high-class prostitute.  The gossip strikes a chord in Séverine’s imagination and when Husson (Piccoli) – a rich libertine with an obsession for the young bride – tells her about Madam Anaїs’ brothel, one he used to go to and that he particularly liked, she goes there and introduces herself to the shrewd maîtresse.

Anaїs’ expert eye spots immediately something mysterious and fascinating in Séverine - a mixture of purity and perversity - that will surely attract her clients, and to which she herself is not immune.  So, after an initial wavering brought under control by Anaїs’ firm hand, Séverine starts playing her new role as Belle de Jour – Beautiful by Day.

Taking on the character of 'Belle de Jour' seems to be therapeutic for Séverine.  She becomes self confident, cheerful and grows closer to her husband – both emotionally and physically.  Everything runs smoothly while the two dimensions of her life remain parallel.  But at the very moment they intersect, Séverine’s persona and inner world start crumbling down – till the whole of her reality falls to pieces.

In Belle de Jour, Brunuel looks at female sexual life from two different, at times antithetic psychological and social, perspectives.  From the view of a bourgeoisie, chauvinist society, the sexuality of a ‘respectable’ woman must be confined to marriage, while remaining the passive object of the ‘natural’ – and culturally accepted – erotic desire of any man; every instinct, fantasy or self perception that doesn’t fit into this picture is freudianly labelled as devious – and in such a way it’s interiorised by the protagonist.

The other view is Séverine’s inner one, a view of sharp images of her ‘Self’ – images her conscience stares at without understanding them, but that are very clear and meaningful to her unconscious.  They guide her actions in spite of her thoughts and social conditioning.

Through the vivid images of Séverine’s dreams, Brunuel guides the viewer in the journey of self discovery of a young woman torn apart between her imposed public persona and her vital erotic urges.  The journey leads her to a psychic and social territory governed by rules and forces unknown to her, and that will completely reshape her existence.

Brunuel’s visual language is highly symbolic but easily accessible, because it draws on the imaginary of the collective unconscious.

Every scene is built with an extreme, Parisian elegance that mirrors Séverine’s refined beauty and this sophisticated beauty is used to tell a story of shocking sexuality, sordid and aggressive chauvinism, and petty social hypocrisy.

Reviewed by Claudia Sandroni, Premier Movie Reviews 2007

• Catherine Deneuve
• Jean Sorel
• Michel Piccoli
• Genevieve Page
• Macha Méril

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

A Personal Collection of Favourite Films, Compiled and Reviewed by Claudia Sandroni...