Kirpianuscus ...or, more exactly you feel it. the motivation of characters. the atmosphere of school. the relation between Christina and Nicole. and, sure, the end. who, if you see for the first time, it is more than impressive. that did it one of challenge - film. not only for the story and acting. but for the chance to discover a high quality thriller. a film who easy coul be defined as legendary. for a simple motif - it seems perfect. not only as Henry Clouzot work but for so many suggestions for imagine a version by Hitchcock. because all the small ordinary details are present. all what you expect becomes more than shown in admirable manner. the fragility of Vera Clouzot. the cold force of Simone Signoret. and, sure, the performance of Paul Meurisset. a beautiful work. admirable for each scene .

JohnHowardReid I'm in two minds, however, about H.G. Clouzot's Les Diaboliques. It is certainly a movie that captured audiences in 1955. On a recent viewing of Criterion's excellent DVD, however, holes in the plot became more evident, and, even worse, the acting of Simone Signoret deteriorates badly. The similarities to Vertigo (which Boileau and Narcejac wrote for Hitchcock when Clouzot outbid him for the rights to Diabolique) are also a minus. Fortunately, the squalid boarding-school setting is still rich in atmosphere and veteran actor Pierre Larquey's impersonation of a put-upon schoolmaster rates as one of the finest of his extensive (well over 200 movies!) career. Charles Vanel, however, is wasted in a minor role as a last act, intrusive, yet ultimately miscalculating ex-policeman.

Leofwine_draca LES DIABOLIQUES is a spooky and intense classic from France, a psychological thriller in which a pair of women decide to kill a bullying and controlling school headmaster. One of them is his wife, the other his mistress, and both hate him for good reason. Their plot goes to plan but the psychological toll of what they have done weighs heavy on them, compounded by further mystery when the body goes missing.There's very little to dislike about this classic movie which has a sheen of quality to it. The expert direction draws out the suspense of the situation without resorting to jump scares or sinister music; the camera-work is very fine and the slow-moving nature of the narrative allows you to become fully immersed in the realism of the piece. The actors are exemplary, as you would imagine, and the film features some quite wonderful ghastly set-pieces involving corpses rising from baths and the like. That it is still frightening when seen today says plenty.LES DIABOLIQUES is also an influential movie; try watching Hitchcock's PSYCHO and in particular Kubrick's THE SHINING afterwards, you can see this film's fingerprints all over them. The Shaw Brothers studio even went ahead to make their own, even more involved spin on the story, the quite wonderful HEX which turns out to be very nearly every bit as entertaining as this film, albeit in a quite different genre. Horror and thriller fans will be in their element with this outstanding lesson in movie-making.

Hitchcoc If there is a better psychological thriller, I'd like to see it. Michel is a nasty master at a school where two young women work. They despise him. He is cruel to them. He is cruel to the students. When the have had enough they decide to kill him. They invite him to their place and drug him, later drowning him in a bathtub. The body is easily gotten rid of. I won't say any more because it would ruin everything. This will keep you on the edge of your seat. This has incredible pacing and atmosphere. There is that plotting where one wonders when the next shoe will fall. This is so Hitchcock-like. Amazing.