Disturbing yet enthralling

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

One of the movies that keep on running long after you've stopped watching. One of those paradoxical stories, that become the more confused the more one understands. One of those one is tempted to watch again and again, hoping to understand this time, at the same time anxious to spoil the commitment by finally finding out what it's all about. Perhaps paradox is the key. Nicole Garcia's tempting beyond all limits turns out to be destruction (poor telephone!), Piccoli's apparent impotence turns out to be masterminding some hideous plan, Bohringer's menacing ways lead to redemption. The more Malavoy gets into the mess, the more lustfully he ventures on getting even deeper into it. Malavoy's father hands the little time-bomb to his son as if it was his old watch or camera, wishing him luck and grinning as if it's been just another visit of a beloved child. And things become boring once they're solved and all the hoods dead. What's left is a country community on an old farm. Who wouldn't yearn to be back in the beautiful and elegant bourgeois world Malavoy and his pupil have just left, the corruption and conspiracy it conceals below an innocent surface not being an odd, but the matter you actually want.

There are films where things happen that at first do not make sense.So you think about it all during and maybe after.Maybe you watch it again.Now MEMENTO would be one of those films.Then there would be DEATH IN A FRENCH GARDEN.Almost every aspect of the plot makes no conventional sense.There are some seriously open ended concepts.eg the father allegedly had boyfriends earlier in life,there is mention that the mother only wants the guitar teacher because he looks like her brother.Who really wants who and how are any of them really connected?The alleged hit-man seems to have set the teacher up for the fall all along,but then doesn't have any bullets in his gun on purpose at the time needed.OK,every aspect of his character screams wannabe lover of the teacher,which is maybe why he allows him to know a version of the truth which results in him coming into 300,000 Francs for making every mistake in the book. Why is there no lock on the new place?What is the point of the teasing,perverse neighbour who lies about everything? I ended up thinking that the makers of this film were having a laugh because every aspect of every character could be a lie.Not one thing about any of them holds up to examination or belies true human interaction and behaviour. Even though at the end it is totally frustrating,I still liked the damn thing!Its open to numerous interpretations,but I don't think any would truly hold water.I think really its just a deconstruction of the labyrinthine narrative of the conventional thriller/neo-noir.None of it means anything...because I may not sleep for a week thinking about what it all means really...and no film is that important!

Although the film has some very beautiful & erotically tense scenes, the little & few dialogues, combined with moody glares, make even some of the completely silent scenes very threatening. It's a little like listening to the rumbling of a live volcano, not being able to run and wondering if, and when it will erupt.

Péril en la demeure is a rather unusual little thriller, in which musician David Aurphet starts an affair with the mother of his pupil. Her husband finds out and David's life has some nightmarish turns. I have to admit that my description makes it sound rather conventional but it certainly is not.It is debatable how well this film works as a thriller, but there is no doubt that the love scenes between Nicole Garcia and Christophe Malavoy are absolutely stunning. They ooze sensuality and are almost like a ballet, both people moving sensitively, slowly, and silently, suggesting, responding to the other, teasing and hesitating, touching and retreating. These few little scenes belong to the most erotic moments ever to be put on celluloid.