This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Sadly Over-hyped

Great visuals, story delivers no surprises

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

This film has the best sex scenes. You can tell it's about obsession. Early 1990s were a period when a lot of that sort of sex-obsessed films were released. I guess people got tired of AIDS and decided to focus on other not-so-minor problems caused by illicit sex. Jeremy Irons and Juliette Binoche are both wonderful in it. They are two intelligent people turned on by danger and unfortunately, they find each other. I love the contemporary late eighties-early nineties costumes, when men and women didn't dress like slobs. Jeremy looks so sexy in his suits. Miranda Richardson as his wife does a wonderful job, especially when she cries. Rupert Graves as his unassuming son and Leslie Caron as Juliette's (Anna's) mother are also great. Photography and set design look like out of Tina Turner's video - not a bad thing at all. It's a highly enjoyable erotic drama.

Were I to go along with the analysis/theorising surrounding this title both in the reviews themselves and the more than usual comments in the discussion section I may well remind myself that it was directed by Louis Malle who had already made a film centred on incest rather than one in which incest is merely a factor. Arguably the earlier film was more personal to Malle involving as it did mother and son in the here and now rather than siblings several years in the past. Not having read the novel on which Damage is based I have no idea how large the incest factor featured but the fact that Malle read it and optioned it virtually on publication - the film itself was released within a couple of years of publication - may be pertinent. Judging it just on its merits as a film it is well written, photographed, directed and acted and on balance more art house than multiplex.

Some movies are like a train wreck. Others are like waves on a beach: pretty, predictable, and about just as boring. And then there are some those that leave you wondering what you would've done in that situation. Damage is one such. A powerful British politician has an affair with his son's fiancée, culminating in the son's accidental death (after catching the two in the act, no less). The cold, selfish manner in which the minister and the son's fiancée indulge each others' sexual desires with no thought whatsoever to the lives of the family they destroy is at once compelling and disgusting. It doesn't hurt that casting director Patsy Pollock picked just about the best possible actors for this project. Louis Malle directs, and everything else—the music, the cinematography, the sets—helped create a brilliant piece of art. Now this is what a romance should be like—powerful enough to destroy empty if socially successful lives… not the kind of insipid mush Hollywood loves to churn out season after season.

Jeremy Irons is wonderful as Dr. Stephen Fleming, a politician aspiring to the cabinet, a man who is good at "little things" (as his wife notes), like environmental issues, political talks in Brussels, and public relations. He also has a seemingly "perfect" family life. Miranda Richardson is very good here in an understated performance, as his wife. Also, Rupert Graves as son Martyn.Martyn meets Anna (Juliette Binoche), who dresses in black leather (rater trite, typecasting costume at first), and who immediately is attracted to Dr. Fleming although she is dating his son.There is an excellent cameo with the always lovely Leslie Caron as Binoche's infamous mother ( a fun woman married four, almost five times) who makes the mistake of mentioning that Ana has usually been attracted to "the wrong type of man" until now.She is insightful and asks Dr. Fleming to step away from her daughter so as her daughter may have a future, and happy marriage.Of course, as affairs go, the story makes sense, since it cannot be controlled, Dr. Fleming cannot stop his compulsion to be with Anna. The sex scenes are effective and not crudely done, although in the first scene as they make love, Binoche seems rather stiff as she submits to Stephen, after inviting him over to her apartment.I appreciated the realistic and sometimes sardonic nature of this film. An affair always has far reaching effects. The end is a bit of a shock but fits with the motif of this story. I had seen this film many years ago and while Juliette Binoche is lovely I sometimes had the casting idea that a different actress may have fit the wanton role more aptly, not sure who though.At any rate this is an excellent film with many gray areas, anyone who has been married and been through infidelity will appreciate the nuances of this film. 10/10.