Saturday, April 26, 2008

Dirty Like an Angel (1991)

So, there's one other film Breillat wrote and directed that's not on DVD: 1991's Dirty Like an Angel (Sale comme un ange)... Filmreference.com says the film, "chronicles the relationship between the wife of a young cop and her husband's partner, a self-hating, fifty-year-old police inspector. The sex scenes between the two are as fiercely candid as those in 36 fillette." While filmsdefrance.com offers a slightly more detailed synopsis: "A fifty-something police inspector Georges Deblache appears to have had enough of life. A confirmed bachelor, who has grown used to dinners-for-one and nights with prostitutes, he envies his young partner, Didier Theron, who has recently married an attractive woman, Barbara. Deblache realises that he is intensely drawn to Barbara and she, although disgusted by her feelings, gives into the desire she also has to sleep with him…" There's also a review of the film which states, "What is most striking about this film is its sense of realism and the totally unromantic way in which a romantic liaison is portrayed. ...This is not an easy film to watch – the austere realist style and limp policier backstory drains the film of surface emotion, making it a hard film to engage with. Yet it is the unusual, convention-breaking style of the film which ultimately makes it so appealing, which allows us to be drawn into the brittle lives of its protagonists and to appreciate their torn inner feelings." (Click the link to read the review in its entirety.)

But, as with Nocturnal Uproar, we can't see it for ourselves to make our own opinions, because it's only ever been released on video as an untranslated, French PAL VHS... no DVD at all. Hopefully, eventually, whichever studio owns the rights to this film will change finally that.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

i was looking around for reviews of this film, and found your page. Just in case you care it's been released in the US this week by Pathfinder. (They also released another older Breillat movie recently, Night After Night).