Anges exterminateurs, Les (2006)

Réalisateur:

Jean-Claude Brisseau

Scénariste:

Jean-Claude Brisseau (writer)

Release Date:

13 septembre 2006 (Belgium)

Genre:

Drame | Fantasy

Plot:

A filmmaker (van den Driessche) holds a series of boundary-pushing auditions for his project about female pleasure. |

Plot Keywords:

Self Destruction | Group Masturbation | Female Genitalia | Sex | Movie Director

Avis des utilisateurs:

Black Narcissus.

Ensemble

Frédéric van den Driessche	...	François
Maroussia Dubreuil	...	Charlotte
Lise Bellynck	...	Julie
Marie Allan	...	Stéphanie
Sophie Bonnet	...	La femme de François
Raphaële Godin	...	Apparition 1 / Rebecca
Margaret Zenou	...	Apparition 2
Jeanne Cellard	...	La grand-mère
Virginie Legeay	...	Virginie
Estelle Galarme	...	Olivia
Marine Danaux	...	Agnès
Apolline Louis	...	Céline
François Négret	...	L'ami de Stéphane
Christophe Maillard	...	Le producteur
Françoise Bonnet	...	La voisine escalier

Autre(s) titre(s) :

The Exterminating Angels (USA) (new title)

Durée:

100 min

Pays:

France

Langue:

Français

Couleur:

Couleur

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Son:

Dolby

Classification:

Japan:R-18 | South Korea:18 | Brazil:18 | USA:Not Rated | France:-16 | Singapore:(Banned) | Portugal:M/16 | Germany:16 | Hong Kong:III

Company:

TS Productions

Black Narcissus.

Francois is an aging French auteur, prepping a film that he hopes will give him some insight into the enigma of female arousal, perhaps even leading to "mystical orgasm" caught on camera. You get the impression that he's one of those Catherine Breillat types who gripe about the artifice of Hollywood sex scenes: "People, zee don't make lurv like that!" To this end he's trying to find actresses who aren't too hardened or professional, in other words, girls who won't be acting when they go beyond their normal sexual boundaries on camera.

What becomes clear over the course of the movie is that Francois's emphasis on natural actresses is anything but natural, that he is taking unstable, not very bright young girls and coercing them, molding them and -- worst of all -- flattering them. Not only that, but these girls never stop acting! Of the three he chooses for his lead roles, only one would "naturally" be lesbian; but stick a camera at them and suddenly, it's rug burn time. Francois' search for the secret to female jouissance uncovers the pornographic truth; that it is not transgression that turns on the modern woman of Paris, or anywhere else, but the act of being recorded and watched transgressing. This has the effect of cancelling out not only pleasure, not only transgression, but love itself.

All this is just the beginning of the dark implications of this quietly startling feature by Jean-Claude Brisseau. Despite its innocuous surface -- just one man, three kinky chicks and a camera -- no better film has yet been made about the hopeless narcissism of our post-millennial wasteland. Brisseau is smart enough to avoid modern trappings that would date his film, such as having the girls post their own videos to YouTube or onto their own websites such as "Les Filles Perdues." But that's essentially what's happening; Francois is not a human but a camera, whose power is in manipulating others to be what they aren't just because he's around. But at the same time, it can't be said he's stripping them of "real lives." The alternatives, such as working in computers or going crazy, makes you understand why this retreat into self-worship is so attractive for so many.

Meanwhile, throughout the movie we hear snippets of dialogue that sound like they were taken from Scott Walker's album The Drift, like "Their blue desert is only a circle ringed by hell." Athletic female angels, who describe themselves as "not angels anymore, but not witches yet either," watch over the proceedings, and I'll confess that I didn't quite grasp their concern with Francois. But in the ravings of the most troubled of Francois' protégés, Charlotte, who at one point erupts "I'm the bride of Satan!" we see the only evidence of what's left of Christianity -- a repressed vampiric imago. The movie leaves you with the impression that everyone on earth today is damned.