Cruel Intentions (1999)

reviewed by
Nathaniel R. Atcheson


Cruel Intentions (1999)
Director:   Roger Kumble
Cast:  Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe, Reese Witherspoon, Selma
Blair, Christine Baranski, Joshua Jackson
Screenplay:  Roger Kumble
Producers:  Neal H. Moritz
Runtime:   90 min.
US Distribution: Columbia
Rated R:  sex, language, drug use

Copyright 1998 Nathaniel R. Atcheson

When I first saw the preview for Cruel Intentions, I turned to my friend and said, "Dangerous Liaisons for Kids!" It was clear to me that the film would be an obvious chunk of plagiarized nonsense, owing everything it is to Stephen Frears' 1988 masterpiece. Imagine my surprise to see that writer/director Roger Kumble has given credit to his source material: Choderlos de Laclos is recognized for his novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses in the opening credits. And I was impressed.

In fact, I was much more impressed with this recognition than with the actual film, which is an appalling excuse for a movie. It's kiddie-porn hackwork, complete with earthy sex-talk and fully-clothed hand-jobs. I suppose this kind of movie was inevitable; with all the teen high-school angst movies coming out, there was certainly room for a pretentious and laughable movie about a bunch of teenagers who think they're smarter and more beautiful than all the other people on earth combined. Cruel Intentions is a mess in every possible way, and it fails primarily in the way I expected it to: I hated all the characters, and I hate everything they do.

I also hate Ryan Phillippe, so perhaps my opinion is not as objective as it could be. Phillippe plays (check out this name) Sebastian Valmont. Wow. Isn't that a memorable name? I could just say it over and over again. Sebastian Valmont. It kind of rolls off the tongue, in the spirit of phrases like Sanguine Vapors and Velvet Sandwich. Sebastian Valmont is the coolest guy who ever walked the earth; there is no woman he can't have, no material object out of his reach. He has all the money, all the sex -- all at his fingertips. And, luckily, his parents never enter into his life -- no, in the world of Cruel Intentions, adults don't really exist. The ones who do are irritating.

Sebastian Valmont lives with his stepsister, Kathryn Merteuil (Sarah Michelle Gellar), the bitch-queen of the universe, and also the woman every man wants. Since these two rich kids are so bored, they only thing they can do is challenge each other with meaningless sexual liaisons. Kathryn wants Sebastian Valmont to de-virginize Cecile Caldwell (Selma Blair), a naive dork-chick who has somehow wronged Kathryn. But it's too easy for Sebastian Valmont -- he wants to nail Annette Hargrove (Reese Witherspoon), the "paradigm of chastity and beauty." So, Sebastian Valmont and Kathryn make a deal (which is too explicit to state here). But -- dear God! -- Sebastian Valmont actually begins to fall for poor Annette Hargrove.

Dangerous Liaisons is a great movie because the characters are all believable, and because of its masterful acting. Cruel Intentions is bad for many reasons, but it lacks both believable characters and masterful acting. Kathryn Merteuil is simply a hateful witch, a girl so loathsome that I would probably enjoy pouring hot lead on her. She is supposed to be mean, but Glenn Close gave the character some depth in Dangerous Liaisons. Gellar, while aesthetically pleasing, is one-dimensional and utterly repulsive. Witherspoon has a truly beautiful face, but her character isn't the moral staple she's supposed to be: sure, she won't have sex until she's in love (is this really a *moral* issue?), but she does some things in the last few scenes that are more than a little reprehensible.

But I can't forget Mr. Phillippe, who continues to exceed my expectations with his impenetrable, invulnerable blandness. I have to give him credit and say that he did, in fact, manage to change his facial expression about three times during the course of Cruel Intentions. And there's one point in the film in which he shouts, thereby defeating my hypothesis that he is vocally monotone. True, he is bad, but it doesn't help that he has no character to work with. Kumble has drained all the interesting aspects from this character, leaving us with a sex-crazed lunatic who is supposed to be sympathetic because he falls in love with a moral flower and shuns the wicked bitch.

The film fails in every other way, too. First of all, nobody talks like this. Even the "intellectuals" I know don't bother with this kind of pointless and pretentious yammering. For a while, the movie looks like it might play itself for laughs, but it ends up taking itself so seriously that there's no way we can join it. Cruel Intentions also manages to come off as soft-porn in more than one scene. Earlier I mentioned a fully-clothed hand-job; this occurs between Kathryn and Sebastian Valmont, both of whom are intended to be hateful at this point in the movie. So, if we hate them, then what's the point of an extended sex scene? Titillation, of course. It can't even work under the pretense of "meaningful love scene," because we hate the characters.

It's interesting to note some of the parallels between Cruel Intentions and Dangerous Liaisons. Kumble is clearly familiar with the earlier film; many of the scenes have a similar tone, and there are moments in Frears' film that Kumble imitates almost completely (such as the last scene, in which [spoiler warning!] the antagonist is humiliated in front of her peers). But kids don't act like this. Nobody acts like this. In his translation, Roger Kumble forgot character development and sympathy -- some pretty crucial elements. The result is a picture of confounding badness, a kiddie-porn mess that thinks it's really deep and profound. I'll give Cruel Intentions credit for realizing its influences, but that doesn't change the fact that it's awful.

Psychosis Rating:  2/10

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           Nathaniel R. Atcheson

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