dwmccormick First and foremost, this movie is beautifully filmed. The art director obviously had a ball with the sets, clothing, and other period details. He or She put a lot more care and detail into every scene than I would have expected, and it's a delight to watch. I find myself peeking into every nook and corner-. And the cars! Even if this movie was terrible in every way, it would be worth watching (or skimming) just to see the 1960's Rolls Royce, Maserati, Bentley and other gorgeous vintage European cars. Divine music: Motown, blues and a bit of rock and roll. This movie intentionally moves at a slow, even pace, and the richness of the period details help keep the mind and eye occupied. I'm not exaggerating by much when I say that this movie could be viewed with the sound off. It's like looking at a high-end fashion catalog from the early and mid-1960's - if you like that sort of thing (which I do).Secondly, I think it's important to keep in mind that that this book was not originally written as either a morality tale or critique of ancien regime aristocrats. The fact that it's interpreted that way speaks only of our contemporary sensibilities. Valmont's death is pointless, and Merteuil loses nothing except her position within the demi-monde. Like Versailles the characters in this movie exist in an amoral plane. Common notions of morality simply do not apply to these aristocrats. The very rich (like the very poor), have nothing to lose.Third, this is a very funny movie if viewed with a certain amount of irony. I'm glad this version doesn't psychoanalyze the characters - Everyone is exactly what they seem to be. If the characters were complex and 3 dimensional, watching the slow sadistic manipulation, seduction and disposal of other lifelike characters would be unendurably painful. As it is, it's comical. I can only smile and laugh at their breathtaking cruelty. One of my favorite scene is when Valmont's aunt Rosamonde tells him that Tourvel has left because he is making her suffer so. Biting his thumb and with a look of sheer demonic glee he asks "Is she really suffering?" Very very funny. But only because he is, existentially, a predator and nothing else. The director studiously avoids delving beneath the surface of these characters. True to the source material, (and life at Versailles) appearance is the only reality.This movie is beautiful to look at, and it's a lot of fun to watch the audacity with which these cold, emotionally bleached aristocrats ruin others and themselves for no good reason (other than sheer boredom).

pmullinsj *** It is strange that I could have gotten them mixed up.But perhaps not really.I don't think Deneuve laughs or cries in 'Les Liaisons Dangereuses.' But the laughter I mentioned before in'Indochine'.I don't think I remember any laughter in 'Indochine.' It now comes back.Those sounds of Lalique were Deneuve's acting of weeping.It is a most oddly inhuman sound when she "cries" on screen.I wonder if her emotional range is limited to "great-actressy" sounds, because it is undeniable that she is a great actress.Yes, those sounds are DIFFERENT. They are parallel to the voices one hears that are mechanically produced and you hear them on the telephone. Somehow robotic, but the sounds of Deneuve crying are moving. They sound like someone who can't quite cry. There hadn't been room for it before, so the ability was lost for her.Or maybe they are the cries and tears of a kind of nobility. Maybe all her real grief is mute and experienced without any sounds, so that when she must weep in a role--and that weeping has to bow to convention in that it has to be heard as some kind of tears that a general public can understand as such--it inevitably sounds artificial.Her most convincing emotions are anger and disgust. Expressions of dissembling are frequent, but an unadulterated joyousness does not seem to be in her repertoire. We hear "French National Treasure" and we hear the inner revolt against this form of high machinic enslavement, a Deleuzian concept that can be found at the higher social levels just as at the lower. (I should have pointed out in my long notes on 'Les Liaisons Dangereuses', for anyone not familiar with 'Wild Palms', that I saw the former film in some ways an "heir" to the latter. 'Wild palms' was of course the Oliver Stone/Bruce Wagner miniseries of 1993, in which the Church of Synthiotics is a mutation of the Church of Scientology. 'Wild Palms' was more obviously cyber-oriented than 'Liaisons', but the modernization of 'Liaisons', a thing I can rarely bear personally whether in theatre or opera, does here make the thing even more menacing, regardless of the fact, pointed out by other reviewers, that a few things just will not quite translate from the bewigged period.)

debblyst Catherine Deneuve has always been one of my favorite stars, she's been in more good films than most, is obviously a very intelligent woman, an iconic beauty who has worked with the world's best filmmakers, so I try to see her every movie that reaches Brazil (not so many anymore). But this unspeakably inept adaptation of Choderlos de Laclos' timeless classic seems to work only on two levels: as a jaw-dropper for lush costume design and as an involuntary cautious warning against plastic surgery!! Just see what lousy jobs those doctors have done with Deneuve and Rupert Everett! While Deneuve now goes into a kind of Joan Crawford territory, has difficulty in flexing her facial muscles and has mouth ticks, Everett has had so much Botox that his forehead shines like a surfing board, and he seems perfectly fit to play the creature in a Frankenstein movie. Incapable of moving any muscle from the tip of his hair to his chin, it was fun just to turn off the volume and wonder what "emotions" he was supposed to portray!! Lovely Nastassja Kinski is once again totally wasted (what's the problem? can't she get a better agent or isn't she interested at all in making decent films?) and likewise is wonderful Danielle Darrieux (who has aged so gracefully and is still beautiful in her 80s).Josée Dayan has worked a lot for French TV, and must be 1) a very good sport 2) a quick-shooting, budget-respecting, producer's dream kind of director. That's the only explanation I can think of to the fact that, whenever a French miniseries adaptation of a great writer (Cocteau, Hugo, Druon, Balzac, George Sand, Beaumarchais etc) with famous stars gets a green light, she gets to direct it. And she consistently gets to make them always blah. This is really bad, sorry to say, don't waste your time - especially if you're a fan of the stars. And God forbid those plastic surgeons!! My vote: 1 out of 10 (well, 3 out of 10 if you're in the mood for a mean laugh...)

jandewitt How could a big splashy TV-event starring the combined beauty of Miss Deneuve, Miss Kinski and Miss Sobieski and the reptilian charm of Mister Everett miss?By being rather dull and boring. Somewhat based on that stalwart tale of love, revenge, lust and hate 'Liaisons Dangereuse' the story takes place in a kind Swinging Paris and casts French Idol Deneuve as the Real Wicked Witch of the West. And that's the major fault of the otherwise adequate show: Miss Deneuve, looking alarmingly like Ivana Trump in decay, is much, much too old (and, I'm sorry to admit, old looking) to be credible as the most amoral woman this side of the Channel. Mister Everett fares a little better, but not much. Poor Nastasja Kinski! Once a glamorous and talented star she is relegated to a mere piece of furniture. And Miss Sobieski (said to be the great-great-great niece or something like that of Jan Sobieski, who defeated the Turks in the battle of Kahlenberg and so saved Vienna in 1683) appears rather frumpy and plumpy. No sings of her remarkable talent she demonstrated in the much underrated damsel-in-distress shocker 'The Class House' not so long ago.All in all: a monumental waste of time and money. Even Roger Vadim fared better with his less-than-adequate modern version of de Laclos' glum tale.