"Douche froide" (Cold Shower) is the first part of an exciting triptych written, produced and directed by Pierre Alt from late 1996 to 2008 now available on DVD at Starlight Productions. The trilogy consists of three shorts (the two others being "Rendez-vous fatal" and "Chambre 18") on the same theme, sex out of wedlock in a hotel room, but with variations which prove imaginative and unexpected. To summarize "Douche froide" would mean giving the viewer a... cold shower, since it would spoil the pleasure of discovery, a key quality common to the three films. Suffice it to say that there is a costly room in a luxury hotel, a French collector and a woman (he met a few hours before) with whom he is spending the night. Oh! I almost forgot, there is also a precious dagger which plays an important part in the story... As for the action, I could easily sum it up (the plot does have a backbone) but if I did so that would be another betrayal to the movie. For the facts as they are seen on the screen are never proved. In the uncertain world of "Douche froide", we spectators are indeed constantly made to navigate between dream (most often bad), fantasy (chiefly unsettling) and reality (not much more reassuring). By way of example, when the collector cuts his finger the event is supposed to happen in a nightmare sequence, so how come he bleeds in the 'realistic' scene that follows? So much so that when, after a remarkable final twist, we think we have understood the whole thing, our next reaction is... to start asking ourselves new questions: How can such or such detail be explained ? Is that dream, fantasy or reality? We do not know for certain and our only wish is... to watch the film again! "Douche froide" is undeniably the most fascinating part of Pierre Alt's trilogy thanks mainly to the spellbinding atmosphere of anxiety the helmer manages to create. Alt, who has a sure hand at it does not need Grand Guignol Effects to achieve his ends: a rainy night outside the windows, bluish cool tones, slick camera moves, intriguing editing, a high angle shot and a minimalist score by Simon-Anatol Weber are enough for him to make the viewer both want to know what comes next and fear it. But neither a sure technique nor effective suspense (as is here the case) are enough raise a film above average; to leave a deep mark it takes substance. And substance there is in "Douche Froide". What actually makes it last in our mind is the way Pierre Alt gets us into the troubled psyche of his male protagonist. The collector should be the conquering hero (hasn't he managed to acquire a very rare artefact and seduced a beautiful woman at the same time?) Why then is he feeling so bad, so insecure, so frail as to prove impotent? And are his sadomasochist tendencies only sexual? Is he in control or is he being controlled by his "conquest"? A question that can be expanded to many specimens of the "male club", however chauvinist they are. Very well interpreted by Féodor Atkine (who captures all the nuances of physical and emotional discomfort) and German actress Marita Marschall (whose mysterious elegance recalls Eva Marie Saint in Hitchcock's "North by Northwest"), "Douche froide" is a short but gripping thriller which lingers on in the mind long after the end credits have ceased to roll.
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