Sunday, January 15, 2012
love/crime
This French film is a wonderful drama that begins benignly and then morphs into a murder mystery. The story is focused on two executives who work for the same company in Paris. The first woman is played with great dexterity by Kristin Scott Thomas who acts equally well in both French and English films. She is unscrupulous , without principle, conniving, and brutal. No one, male or female, is spared her venom. In this film her main adversary, as she sees it, is a younger woman who is sensitive, loyal, highly creative and an innocent. She begins her job with the same attitude that most of us have when we join a firm. She wants to do well and please her boss (Thomas) When Thomas takes credit for several ideas that the younger woman proposes, we see the writing on the wall. Following several public humiliations by Thomas the younger woman plots her revenge. And quite a revenge it is. The film is not just a battle of wits; it also focuses on obsession, a love/hate relationship, and the place of women in the working world. The film is made with such brilliance that before we know it, the end of the story is upon us. There a are couple of plans that may get lost to the viewer, but pay no mind. It all comes together at the end. Only the French could make a film like this, with so much attention to detail.
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