DANGEROUS LIAISONS
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1989 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Beautifully filmed and acted adaptation
of a scandalous French novel of 1782 and the play based on it
by Christopher Hampton (who also wrote the screenplay). The
film proceeds like a sexual chess game with two master
players and a board full of pawns. One of the year's best.
Rating: +3.
It is the France of Louis XVI and the aristocracy has turned sex into a game like chess with strategy and tactics. The Marquise de Merteuil seems prim and proper, but behind the facade she is a conniving power-monger who on a whim can destroy the lives of those around her. If less capable of escaping notice for his sexual manipulations, no less adroit at the manipulation is the Vicomte de Valmont. The Marquise, to get revenge on a former lover, suggests that the Vicomte seduce the innocent 16-year-old fiancee of the lover. But the Vicomte considers seduction of the innocent too small a challenge; instead, he will attempt seduction of the truly virtuous and proposes to bed the highly moral Madame de Tourvel. The Vicomte then proceeds to accomplish both challenges. and the film becomes a sort of sexual "Mission Impossible" as under a cultured facade this merciless game of strategy and tactics takes place.
Based on the stage play LES LIAISONS DANGEREUSES and the 1782 novel of the same title by Choderlos de Laclos, DANGEROUS LIAISONS comes to the screen beautifully directed by Stephen Frears. Losing the immediacy of a live on-stage performance, Frears takes full advantage of the new medium by making use of the most perfect facial expressions by John Malkovich as the Vicomte and by Glenn Close as the Marquise. Even if such expression were possible in the stage play, it would be lost on all but the first few rows. The film also stars semi-actress Michelle Pfeiffer, who is as out-classed by Close and Malkovich as her character is by theirs. Frears uses her as little more than a mannequin. It is unfortunate for her sake that she and Frears were content to let her give such a flat performance in a film in which there was real direction and acting going on.
In fairness, I should mention that Malkovich has been criticized for using such an American accent for his role. Why he has been singled out I am not sure. In the syntax of cinema French accents are often used rather than subtitling when the characters would realistically be speaking French. Frears did not follow the convention and I was not bothered by it. I wondered whether an actor as plain-faced as Malkovich could play a man women found so seductive as the Vicomte. This too I never questioned while actually watching the film.
If the very most basic plot is a little too much like some of those incompetently made French sex-romps that show up on late-night cable, everything else is first-rate in this production. I would give DANGEROUS LIAISONS a +3 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
att!mtgzz!leeper
leeper@mtgzz.att.com
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