Cruel Intentions, a movie review
by Sam Sloan
Sebastian (Ryan Phillippe) and his stepsister, Kathryn (Sarah Michelle Gellar), are teenage step-brother and sister, whose parents are married to each other, although, we are told, their father is diddling the Vietnamese maid. They are filthy rich and live in a mansion on Central Park West in New York City, while their parents, who are never seen, are elsewhere.
Sebastian's mission in life is to deflower virgins. He wants a serious challenge, because he is bored with plucking the easy ones. He is not content merely to take a girl's virginity. To complete his mission, he must humiliate her by dumping her the next day. Thus, the title: "Cruel Intentions".
His step-sister is equally if not more diabolical. Pretending to be squeaky clean and virtually a virgin, she publicly wears a cross, which has a secret vial of cocaine inside, and plots with her step-brother the deflowering of the various available incoming freshman virgins in their high school.
She says that she does this because every time she goes to bed with a man, he immediately dumps her for a younger girl, an innocent virgin. This is a problem which all women have or at least fear, but it is noteworthy that a beautiful 18-year-old is jealous of the competition from younger more virginal women.
Kathryn therefore wants to get revenge against virgins, by assisting her step-brother in their deflowering and subsequent humiliation.
This theme, in a different context, is in another new movie: "The Rage: Carrie 2". In "The Rage", the high school athletes keep a scorebook where scores are awarded for their conquests. However, things get out of hand when one innocent girl gives her virginity to an athlete and then kills herself the next day when he dumps her.
There seems to be a trend here: In the films of yesteryear, the female lead successfully fended off suitors and almost never went to bed. Early on, you could tell which girl was going to turn out to be the star of the movie, because she was the one who did not do it.
However, in the new movies, every significant female has sex with a man, including even Queen Elizabeth I, the most famous virgin in history, in "Elizabeth".
Of course, in real life, almost all women do have sex with men and almost all women do eventuality give up their virginity to a man who often turns out to be a cad. Probably, there are few women in the world who have never had the experience at least once in their life of giving sex to a man, with high hopes for the future, only never to be contacted by him again. This is why mothers properly advise their daughters to keep their virginity until marriage, even though they did not so themselves. Thus, we can say that the new movies probably more accurately depict real life than the old, in spite of their extreme references to sexuality.
My main complaint with "Cruel Intentions" is that although it is supposed to depict teenage high school sex, all of the actors and actresses are too old, in their early twenties. One supposedly 16-year-old virgin must be at least 22 in real life.
Of course, one reason for this may be fear of the so-called "child pornography laws", even though there is no actual nudity, only simulated nudity, in Cruel Intentions.
My other complaint is the obligatory moral lesson at the end. Of course, this movie about the deflowering of the endless supply of virgins must somehow end. Here it ends with the death of Sebastian, who is hit by a New York City taxi driver (we all do that), followed by the humiliation of his step-sister, who is publicly exposed to the school for what she really is.
When I saw this I realized that I had seen this movie before. The former name of this movie was "Dangerous Liaisons". The plot is the same. The only difference is that "Dangerous Liaisons" is about the corrupt upper class in18th Century France, whereas "Cruel Intentions" is about the equally rich but contemporary Americans.
One good thing about sex and about the relations, fears, loves and rivalries between men and women is that, throughout history, they have never changed.
Finally, in one other way I find this movie to be unrealistic. Although the seduction skills of Sebastian are much touted, in reality he is put in slam dunk situations. For example, his supposedly major triumph is the deflowering of a transfer student, Annette (Reese Witherspoon). Yet, he has the perfect set-up. He is lodged with her virtually alone in a huge mansion on Long Island. He has access to her day and night, goes swimming in the pool alone with her, sits on the lawn with her, holds her hand, drives her in his car, and yet it takes him two whole weeks to relieve her of her virginity. If I or just about any non-gay man were put in his situation, her virginity would not survive more than a few hours, or a day or two at the very most.
I drive a taxi in New York City and what I found refreshing about this movie is that I go to all the places and do all the things that these rich kids do, and for free. Like them, I too drive across the toll-free Queensboro Bridge. I too sit on the steps of the New York Public Library or next to a lake in Central Park. Every street, every block and every building in this movie is familiar to me. One of the advantages of New York City is that even the poorest can enjoy the pleasures of the super-rich.
Sam Sloan
The above has been posted at http://www.ishius.com/cruel-in.htm
Here are links:
http://www.cruelintentions.com "Cruel Intentions" official web site http://us.imdb.com/Title?Cruel+Intentions+(1999) International Movie Database: Cruel Intentions http://www.reel.com/cgi-bin/nph-session.exe?COBRAND=129Q&OBJECT=moviepage.asp?MMID=44914" "Cruel Intentions"
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