El amante

Based on the semi-autobiographical novel of Marguerite Duras, who was born in French colonial Vietnam, this film chronicles the sexual awakening of a young French girl who falls passionately in love with a Chinese scion of a rich trading family who have his marriage already arranged. They make love passionately in a way which more truthful than is usual on the screen. This film is intensely visual, written by a major French script writer, Gerard Brach, and narrated by the powerful world weary voice of Jeanne Moreau. If you have experienced consuming sexual passion and the pain which it can engender, you will understand this film. If you haven't, this film will give you that vicarious experience. It is all the more truthful because although the relationship is interracial, the passion transcends, whereas the cultural differences block the fulfilment of their true love. It is about how people miss love trapped by convention and common sense. This is a flawless film, beautifully shot--a minor classic, much under-appreciated.

The Lover is not just a movie, it is sensual, breathtaking and intimate sometimes bordering on voyeurism. From the outset the scenery directs the action taking the viewer into a world of a young girl and a Chinese man that embark on a doomed love affair in 1929 Colonial Vietnam. Jane March plays the young 15 year old 'girl'. That is all we know of her as she stands on the front of a ferry cruising the Mekong Dekta. She dressed in a cheap short sleeved dress, straw hat and high heels and heavily rouged lips that belie her age. She is on her way back to a girls' school in Saigon when she is first 'seen'. The second time she is summoned to a black sedan where she meets The Chinaman, smouldering Tony Leung, sitting in the back seat of the car attired elegantly in a tailored white suit. He offers her a ride to her school where a simple, impulsive kiss on the window leads to a frustrating passionate love story laced with cultural misunderstandings. This movie is fueled right from the start with sexual tension. March and Leung are perfect as the two nameless leads who are taken on this journey of first discovery, through latent but palpable lust, then finally to ruin. She cannot love him and he cannot commit without betraying his family's honour and heritage. She will be nothing but his lover, never his wife. I felt a deep sadness for these people, their isolation evident as they silently scream for their individuality in a world that will not accept either of them together, or apart. Jean-Jacques Annaud has done for The Lover what he did for The Bear and The Name of the Rose, gave us characters that are haunting and memorable. The cinematography here is sparse, pale so as to give the story a poignant futility. Gabriel Yared's score is sensual almost brutally so as these characters' bodies come together while their souls never connect. This movie is not for the faint of heart. It IS sexual. The scenes border on artful pornography. Annaud never quite goes that far as to allow it to delve into hard-core, but the scenes are hard to watch. They are so intimate that we believe the leads are making love before our eyes...but we are compelled to watch, transfixed by the intimacy. Throughout we are reminded of the toll the affair has had on the young girl with the tremulous grosgrain narration of the always excellent Jeanne Moreau. She underscores the events and emotions of the sometimes perversely detached lead character. The Lover is based partly on the life of Marguerite Duras of whom March's young girl is almost a dead-ringer. Annaud imbues this story with every emotional nuance forcing us to use its characters as a mirror of our own hidden desires. This is a movie that made me long for what is hidden deep within my secret heart...and a little afraid of what I might find there.

My wife and I were enraptured and thoroughly enjoyed this gem. Deeply evocative and so real that we nearly felt the rain and hot humidity, we were swept along on this unique journey. The external and newsgroup reviews did not ring true for us. Well OK, the characters were very sad and March delivered stilted lines at times, but there was so much magic to see and hear! She sizzled. He struggled. They both yearned for what could not be.

Those harbour and river scenes were no Hollywood set or computer graphics, but just had to be the real thing: Vietnam! The reviews said 'not erotic' and 'like Penthouse'...?!? Just look beneath the surface: even though both characters are trapped in cultural barriers and subsequently repress so many emotions (especially the girl), they escape into the blissfully unreal world of the rented room where emotions run deep albeit confused.

You will not find the usual American 'formula film' composed of glitz, action, intrigue, syrupy sweetness and a predictable ending. Instead here is a film that is complex yet simple, both beautiful and ugly, about separateness and unions, and the sufferings of those who love but cannot love. We were captivated, enchanted. If you are prudish or do not like 'foreign films', then avoid this film. However, if you have ever travelled in Asia, if you love creative cinematography, if you enjoy small subtleties, if you like an insight into the past and a time of strong desires... then see this film! It was refreshing, and we did not want it to end.

I first saw this movie when I was younger, as one of the most graphic "mainstream" movies available. That was before I ever knew what the word "soft-core" meant.

I watched it again, when I was older, and I finally understand it. The quiet sequences and unemotional facade of the female lead are no longer just boring filler between the exciting love scenes. Perhaps it's because I needed a little more life experience to know the unexpressed feelings of the female character and the expressed feelings of the male character. Sure, this movie is about taboo and tasting forbidden fruit. This movie is about sex. But this movie also has very strong depictions of the other emotions involved in the affair. Shame. Guilt. Racial and social prejudice. Love which is explored when both parties know there can be no future. Emotional detachment born out of necessity, as a "defense mechanism". Being ostracized by your peers, and life in an environment rife with vicious rumors. But mostly the shame and guilt. It's made clearer to me what a former lover of mine may have felt.

To live through all that and then to watch this movie makes for a very personal, moving experience. I can't recommend it to everyone, since every movie experience is unique. But I can say that "The Lover" is much, much more than just an excuse for graphic love scenes. It's a story of a reminiscence... a first time... a shameful secret... a hidden love, fostered through hardship and burning into the mind of the narrator an indelible, permanent mark of memory of a first, life-shaping lover...

It's not often I get to see a movie like this. The story of L'Amant potrays a most complex and provocative relationship between a young French girl (Jane March) and a Chinaman (Tony Leung). The two lovers' attraction towards each other are purely physical, but there are a lot of psychological burdens and suffering that they can't break free from, since the two of them are psychologically washed-up people who lives within the shackles of society that they live in. At times they treat each other cruelly while at times they treat each other with tender affection, yet we don't know whether they feel true love for each other or not. That's where the story gets very interesting and different.

The sex scenes are indeed graphic, but by no means done in bad taste or just for the sake of sex. The film is much more than about lust, it is about two lovers who found refuge in each other's arms. Jane March and Tony Leung gave great performances, showing the subtleties of conflicting emotions that they had to endure. Beautifully paced storyline with great atmosphere and soundtrack will make this a worthwhile movie experience. Very highly recommended.