• Privacy policy
  • T&C’s
  • About Us
    • FAQ
    • Meet the Team
  • Contact us
TLE ONLINE SHOP!
  • TLE
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Opinion
  • Elevenses
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • Film
    • Lifestyle
      • Horoscopes
    • Lottery Results
      • Lotto
      • Thunderball
      • Set For Life
      • EuroMillions
  • Food
    • All Food
    • Recipes
  • Property
  • Travel
  • Tech/Auto
  • JOBS
No Result
View All Result
The London Economic
SUPPORT THE LONDON ECONOMIC
NEWSLETTER
  • TLE
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Opinion
  • Elevenses
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • Film
    • Lifestyle
      • Horoscopes
    • Lottery Results
      • Lotto
      • Thunderball
      • Set For Life
      • EuroMillions
  • Food
    • All Food
    • Recipes
  • Property
  • Travel
  • Tech/Auto
  • JOBS
No Result
View All Result
The London Economic
No Result
View All Result
Home Film Articles and Lists

Forgotten Film Friday: Belle de Jour

By Michael McNulty Luis Buñuel’s film Belle de Jour, released in 1967, took the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and stands in film history as one of the most, if not the most, erotic films of all time. Based on Joseph Kessel’s, a Russian who lived in Argentina and wrote in French, novel […]

Kit Power by Kit Power
2017-05-26 08:53
in Articles and Lists, Film
FacebookTwitterLinkedinEmailWhatsapp

By Michael McNulty

Luis Buñuel’s film Belle de Jour, released in 1967, took the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and stands in film history as one of the most, if not the most, erotic films of all time. Based on Joseph Kessel’s, a Russian who lived in Argentina and wrote in French, novel of the same name, Belle de Jour may not seem as salacious now as when it first appeared, both in print and on the silver screen 40 years later. However, this is a film that has not dated and remains poignant in its depiction of the relationship between love and sexual desire.

Séverine (Catherine Deneuve), a housewife, is married to conventionally handsome surgeon Pierre (Jean Sorel) and trapped in a frigid marriage. After learning from Henri (Michel Piccoli), a friend of Pierre’s, about a high class brothel hidden away in a Parisian apartment, Séverine gives in to her dark desires, desires possibly born from having been molested as a child, and visits the place. She soon becomes the new girl and adopts the handle Belle de Jour, which reflect the hours she works, only in the afternoons before 5.

Buñuel has woven into the film flashbacks, memories, day dreams and dreams that continually blur the line between realities, immediate, fantasized and remembered, providing Belle de Jour with an ethereal and surreal, floating quality. Deneuve is perfect playing Séverine, subtle, detached and mysterious with an elegance that forgoes judgement of her sexual aberrations; she enjoys being dominated, and roughed around.

It may come as a surprise that a film with this plotline actually contains very little nudity and absolutely no onscreen sex. And yet, Buñuel has still masterfully crafted a film that studies the erotic, which looks more closely at the relationship and separation of body and soul, love and desire, recognizing that the two are not mutually exclusive and that perhaps to be fulfilled in love is not to be fulfilled in desire.

In one scene a portly Japanese man visits the brothel bringing with him a mysterious and ornately decorated small box, the contents of which is never revealed, but that omits a low buzzing sound. One girl refuses him, before Séverine agrees to indulge him for the afternoon. The content of the box is of no importance, Buñuel instead uses the scene to introduce the idea of the erotic and call attention to the fact that we all have our own fixations and fetishes.

Belle de Jour is a surrealist black comedy that’s sexy and stylish and by the time the credits roll will have you wondering whether you dreamed the whole thing up.

RelatedPosts

Final Thoughts on Cannes 2022

Cannes 2022 Review: Tori and Lokita

Cannes 2022 Review: Pacifiction

Cannes 2022 Review: Elvis

Subscribe to our Newsletter

View our  Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions

Trending on TLE

  • All
  • trending
Abdollah

‘Rescue us’: Afghan teacher begs UK to help him escape Taliban

CHOMSKY: “If Corbyn had been elected, Britain would be pursuing a much more sane course”

What If We Got Rid Of Prisons?

More from TLE

Beginners Guide to Managed Funds

Green Man 2017: PJ Harvey, Ryan Adams and Future Islands to Headline

Plants in the Arctic ‘growing taller due to climate change’

How To Turn Your Hobby Into A Million Dollar Blog

Traditional sheep race axed for the first time in 30 years after owners receive threats from vegans

‘Govt must act faster:’ Funding gap to meet electric charging targets has been revealed

Finally a benefit? Brexit job shortages hit Trump’s Scottish golf resorts

Couple who try to meet 14-year-old girl for sex after grooming her on Facebook are jailed

Human brain ‘wired to prefer foods that are packed with fat and sugar’

Manchester United legend fined, warned by FA for betting breaches

JOBS

FIND MORE JOBS

About Us

TheLondonEconomic.com – Open, accessible and accountable news, sport, culture and lifestyle.

Read more

© 2019 thelondoneconomic.com - TLE, International House, 24 Holborn Viaduct, London EC1A 2BN. All Rights Reserved.




No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Lifestyle
  • Food
  • Travel
  • JOBS
  • More…
    • Elevenses
    • Opinion
    • Property
    • Tech & Auto
  • About Us
    • Meet the Team
    • Privacy policy
  • Contact us

© 2019 thelondoneconomic.com - TLE, International House, 24 Holborn Viaduct, London EC1A 2BN. All Rights Reserved.