FREE ON CINEGEEK.DE Luis Bunel - Belle De Jour 

Belle De Jour, a film that haunted me over and over again. It's the story of a well-off young woman prostituting herself two or three days a week in a brothel. It's probably the most famous erotic film of the modern age and probably the best! This is because Belle De Jour understands eroticism from the inside. Not just as a sight of naked skin and sweat, but as an imagination. We see the film through the perspective of Severine, a respectable 23-year-old wife, played by Catherine Deneuve. Luis Bunuel spent his entire life making cunning films about the mystery of human nature. He was aware of one essential thing that most other directors would never find out: For a woman like Severine, the erotic aspect doesn't result from who is waiting for her in the room, but simply from her entering the room. Sex, that's what she does with herself. Love is something else. The subject of Severine's passion is always Severine herself. She has a few productive marriages with a young, handsome doctor named Pierre (Jean Sorel). Then there is another friend of the family, the gloomy Henri (Michel Piccoli, who was born to look as if he was suggesting something specific). Henri also feels attracted to Severine; to her blonde perfection, her reserve and cold contempt for his person. Once she rebukes Henri to keep his compliments to himself. Severine's secret is her second life, that she leads in the world of her fantasy. There is a gap between her mysterious smile and what she actually thinks. Bunuel himself also has some room in Belle De Jour for his fetish of feet and shoes - he understands that a fetish is nothing more than a fetish! Severine is a masochist and likes to be treated raw. Some of what excites her is not shown in the film, because it belongs to her alone. Furthermore, we experience the famous fantasy sequences of the film, in which Severine lives out her sexuality. The turning point in her life comes when she hears about a brothel where housewives work in the afternoon. She gets the address from Henri. Severine knocks and an older business woman named Madame Anais (Genevieve Page) opens. At first Severine is insecure, runs away, but she returns. Madame Anais has enough experience to recognize Severine's needs. She knows Severine needs a strong hand. There are no explicit sex scenes in Belle De Jour. Most of all I remember the sequence in which a customer opens a box and shows the content to the ladies. We don't see it and we don't really understand it. We only hear a humming voice... The first prostitute refuses the wish of the customer, Severine also. Cut. What was in the box? What was in the box? Bunuel is not interested in the truth. It's about the symbol: It must have been something extremely important for the customer. Something that had an erotic meaning for him. Then two gangsters come into Madame Anais' brothel. With the younger Severine begins an affair that ironically leads us to the melodramatic finale. Severine feels attracted to the gangster's raw street manners. He belongs to her fantasy world - otherwise he cares little for her. The gangster himself cannot understand that such a woman is interested in him. All the more so for us! Luis Bunuel is one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. A surrealist as a young man who views human nature with deep cynicism - not angry, but amused. He was fascinated by the fact that our obsessions have a stronger effect than free will. In many of his films we experience how the characters seem to act freely - but not in reality. Bunuel believed that many people commit themselves early to their sexual ideas and then hold on to them for a lifetime. Severine is such a person. At one point she emphasizes that she doesn't know how to help herself. Severine is lost. She knows that she cheated on her husband with a gangster and regrets it. But she just can't get out of her skin. Her fate seems predestined, like that of her husband, who is not up to his wife's desires. Everything seems inevitable. Once Severine rejects the special practices of a customer. Madame Anais takes her to the next room to look through a peephole and learn. It's disgusting, Severine repels. Then she looks through the hole again.