MartinHafer If this movie had been better paced and had more likable and 3-dimensional characters I would have liked it a lot. As it is, it's at best an average movie. But, the movie is slow as molasses and the pacing crawls like a snail. But, given that Catherine Deneuve's character seems underdeveloped and unlikable, the movie SEEMS even longer and slower than it is. It's really a shame, as there were elements of a good story but it just looks like the film was rushed into production before the complex plot was worked out--sort of looking like it was improvised. And, because of that, it's difficult to know WHO Deneuve is--a drunk, an idiot or a person who LOOKS like a drunk idiot but isn't. Regardless, the film just seemed unreal and pointless. In addition, it abounds with shaky camera work--obviously it was shot with cheap equipment. I'm sorry to sound so negative, but the French are capable of much better stories than this.

notmicro This film would get absolutely no attention otherwise. Story/plot are a convoluted mess; direction and editing are mediocre or worse. Production values are high, but that's pretty typical these days. Lurches from one jarring and opaque scene to another. Especially bizarre is a scene where Deneuve is quite abruptly shown on a train, drunkenly involved in a tough game of cards. Also a very annoying thread runs throughout the film, where various women are showing yelling at men who are bothering them "no leave me alone", then there's a jump to the next scene where they are in bed together.

Bruce Burns I hate French movies. Hate them, hate them, hate them. All things being equal, you couldn't pay me to see a French movie. French dramas are dull, depressing films about people smoking cigarettes and talking about nothing in particular. And French comedies are like bad Jerry Lewis movies with subtitles. Nonetheless, I was dragged to see "Place Vendome" and was pleasantly surprised.This is a thriller about Marianne (Catherine Deneuve), the widow of a prominent Parisian jeweler who is involved in some shady deals before he commits suicide. Marianne is an alcoholic who spends 348 days a year voluntarily confined in a mental hospital. When she is out, she needs a nurse to look after her. When she is sober, her hands shake and she is frightened of everything.Before her husband dies, he tells her about some hot rocks stashed in the house. After he dies, she tries to sell them so she doesn't have to sell her husband's business or go bankrupt. Everyone is too frightened to buy them, but plenty of people want to take them.She also finds out her husband had a mistress named Nathalie (Emmanuelle Seigner)who looks exactly like she did twenty years ago. It turns out they have more than that in common. They are both intimately acquainted with the jewelry business, legal and otherwise. There is not a man that one has slept with that the other has not. And they are both in over their heads on both the business and romantic fronts.What I really liked about this film was that it reminded me so much of Hitchcock's romantic thrillers, particularly "Vertigo". There is a scene at the beginning where Marianne has a breakdown in the middle of a stairwell while Richard Robbins' (or is it Bernard Herrmann's) swirling clarinet fugue score plays. This, I thought, was a wonderful homage to the bell-tower scenes in "Vertigo".There are faults of course. There is just too much coincidence to keep my disbelief suspended for long. And I really would have liked to see more of Nathalie. But overall, this is a stylish thriller from a country where I least expected it. 8 out of 10.

stanton-7 The plot of this film may centre around scams in the the diamond trade but don't expect slick plotlines and witty, glamorous characters. The film offers instead a look behind the glamour at individuals worn down by their lives, by wrong decisions and damaging relationships. These relationships have developed between characters involved at some time in questionable aspects of the trade and appear to suffer as if mirroring the dishonesty and deceitfulness of the scams. It is a story told at a slow pace allowing the details to unfold and to enable us to get to know the characters and understand their motivation. The acting is superb, particularly Catherine Deneuve, and the film ends on a note which suggests some kind of atonement and reconciliation.