John Malkovich's Valmont is one magnificently repellant character. A jaded womanizer more thrilled by the submission of his feeble victims and the chase of reputation than the physical pleasure of the sex his exploits typically entail. Glenn Close's Merteuil is his mirror, a calculating vampire. Uma Thurman's Cécile: the ingenue. Keanu Reeves's Danceny: her young love. And a resplendent Michelle Pfeiffer as the paragonicallly virtuous Madame de Tourvel.
It is a tremendous film with excellent writing. It is nearly all subtext and intrigue.
Valmont and Merteuil are past lovers, intellectual equals, and equally vicious. If Valmont can sleep with Madame de Tourvel and get proof in writing, Merteuil will sleep with him. So begins the game.
I first saw this film three years past. My mouth gaped at Valmont, the soulless boggart. There is a scene early on where he rapes Cécile, stealing into her room at midnight with the key she trustingly provides him to assist her in her own love affair. She nearly screams, she protests. He asks her ~what will your mother think, when she sees the key you have provided me? And later on Cécile spills everything to Merteuil, ~I kept saying no, but that was not what was happening.
What bothered me so prolifically about this transgression was the later events regarding Madame de Tourvel. Valmont falls in love with her and she with him. And so I spat on the film. Such a man is incapable of knowing love! It does not add up. And who is this Tourvel to fall in love with so clearly bankrupt a man? She is no paragon!
I watched the film again and delighted in the structure of it, the writing, the hidden meanings. [Early on, Valmont writes a letter to Tourvel, resting the paper on a courtesan's bare ass. Tourvel catches him late in the movie spending time with the same courtesan. Valmont assures her of the innocence of their relationship. "She's even done a little secretarial work for me on occasion."]
This most recent viewing has hit me differently still. I think we must accept that Valmont really does love Tourvel. He says that ~for the first time in his life, the pleasure of a woman has lasted long after the carnal activity. Merteuil hears this and despair plays across her face. Valmont has not even realized he is truly in love, but Merteuil knows better. I think Merteuil is so incapable of love, so far gone, that to hear her partner in depravity unknowingly stumble into a bit of true happiness is far too much for her to bear.
Really it's gotten me thinking about my own dissatisfaction with love. It's like when you see someone on an online forum say they loved a movie that you know is garbage. But on the other hand, when you see two 16 year olds in love, you can't help but smile. Have you recognized the ebbing of affection in those moments between each amorous transports?
There is a scene with Cécile and Valmont in bed at which point she has grown to enjoy or at the very least get use out of their romping. Valmont reveals that years ago he slept with her mother, a shrew of a woman. Uma Thurman responds with a laugh so unquestioningly youthful it will strike you to the core. A laugh of naïveté. The laugh of a teenager in bed with a 40 year old man. It is uncomfortable. Uma Thurman was 18 during the filming of this movie.
Malkovich is just incredible. I've always been partial to the suave lilt of the English accent for period pieces like this, but his trademark cadence, so deliberate and exacting, brings Valmont into sharp relief.
And Michelle Pfeiffer crushes it also.
Glenn Close is chilling.
The film has left me unsettled. I think I'll wait some years before I give it another go.