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"The Duke Of Burgundy" was a fictional pub in the classic Ealing comedy Passport To Pimlico (1949). It also happens to be the name of a certain species of butterfly found only in England. Far from a film about a friendly neighbourhood pub, or an educational chat with David Attenborough, the 2014 incarnation of The Duke Of Burgundy is encased within a potent atmosphere of unease, sexual tension, twisted eroticism and dark humour. Much like viewing a case of mounted butterflies, we watch the action unfold. Visuals are more important than words. This is a truly cinematic experience that demands its audience closely observe everything before its eyes. The butterfly metaphor may be overused - having been exploited in The Collector (1965) and in The Smiths lyric "You can pin and mount me like a butterfly" - however, it is revisited to great effect in this film.

The film observes the daily routine of Cynthia (Sidse Babett Knudsen) and Evelyn (Chiara D'Anna). Much like insects pinned down and encased under glass, we observe them trapped in a provocative routine that starts with punishment and pleasure and ends with a crumbling emotional facade. As Cynthia yearns for a more conventional relationship, Evelyn's obsession with erotic role-playing threatens to push the two apart.

The Duke of Burgundy is a unique voyeuristic experience courtesy of Peter Strickland, the award winning writer and director of Berberian Sound Studio and Katalin Varga. Much like Berberian Sound Studio, he returns us to the European cult movies of the 1970's. It's refreshing to note that while many recent directors seem to be emulating the crowd-pleasing visuals of The Wachowskis, Lynch, Tarantino or Snyder, Strickland is enthralled with Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci, Jess Franco and Sergio Martino - with a pinch of Bergman. To a certain degree, Strickland's themes and visuals may also owe a debt to lesser known Euro-cult gems like Baby Yaga and Daughters of Darkness.

Anyone who's familiar with The Duke of Burgundy's cinematic lineage knows how essential a good soundtrack is. Many of the original giallo and Euro-sleaze films where soundtracked by the likes of Ennio Morricone, Bruno Nicolai and Goblin. The Duke of Burgundy benefits greatly from a soundtrack by Cat's Eyes, an alternative pop duo featuring vocalist Faris Badwan - of English indie rock band The Horrors - and Italian-Canadian soprano, composer and multi-instrumentalist Rachel Zeffira (sounding rather like Lynch favourite Julie Cruise). Having played their first ever gig in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican, during an afternoon mass "attended by seven high-ranking cardinals", the duo are the perfect choice to compliment Strickland's retro Italo-thriller imagery. The opening credit sequence is an especially good mix of sound and image recalling the era perfectly.

If the overtly commercial eroticism of Fifty Shades of Grey leaves you cold, then head down to The Duke of Burgundy and drink in its intoxicating brew of dark, atmospheric erotica.

Even I, in my 63 year-old female dotage, got the bug. What a great pair. Both the characters and the actors. The story is tight; every moment is important; and there are a lot of silent moments. A couple of lesbians, one rich and older/one cute and younger, live together, love together, and sex up a storm. For the younger one, sex is every waking moment. Even moments with no physical contact. For her the act of being a sex slave makes her deliriously happy and sexy. She always has orders for her dominant queen. She dresses her, tells her how to sit, and how long. The dom is getting a little tired of the whole deal, or is she?

A rather simple "story" or rather vignette about the tensions in a relationship - the two lovers are lesbians (Evelyn and Cynthia) and are playing out a dominance and submission scenario - but basically the problems the couple faces are the same as with most relationships: Boredom by routine, a little jealousy, and Cynthia is having trouble with Evelyn's more and more demanding whims.

What makes this film stand out for me is the all-embracing vision: Acting, costumes, set design, props, music, rhythm - everything works together perfectly to form a total work of art. Usually such a clear and uncompromising concept is restricted to short films; here it's drawn out to 100 lush minutes. I felt positively reminded of Peter Greenaway! There are also some fun visual jokes or references like the mannequins in the audience but they don't take away from the focus.

Now, while that's some praise, there's also drawbacks that come with this single-mindedness: The plot is just a "plot", coming from and leading to nowhere; we never learn much about the characters; the whole thing begins to feel drawn-out. Basically you could have told the thing in 30 minutes without losing much impact. While I can wholeheartedly recommend this beautiful production, I doubt if I'll rewatch it anytime soon in its full length.

Peter Strickland is a film maker who likes to do things differently – his last feature 'Berberian Sound Studio' will mean you will never look at a vegetable the same way again. Here he takes on the theme of a sadomasochistic, lesbian relationship to examine how we all depend on each other and the inter dependencies that can occur to make relationships work. At the heart are two lovers Cynthia and Evelyn who seem to be in a very one sided relationship – one being mistress and one being badly used servant.

They are also both entomologists and give talks on moths and butterflies – the title 'The Duke of Burgundy' is an actual butterfly orange and brown in colour and found in Europe and mostly Southern Britain. The moths also act as a metaphor in the case of being 'drawn to a flame' scenario; but also the many butterflies pinned and mounted that occur throughout the film reflect the love/abuse relationship in that the very beauty that attracts some people cause them to act in cruel way to the object of desire.

This is not 'Fifty Shades of Grey' the sex is all tastefully done off screen. It is also exceptionally beautifully filmed – in Hungary as it turns out. The attention to style and miniscule details is almost obsessive and worth every effort in terms of rewards for the viewer. It is though about relationships and what we will do for each other – even if it goes against our own particular grain. This is a film for those who appreciate art-house but like it to have one foot in realism (at least) and as such is one I both enjoyed and can easily recommend.

This isn't a d/s film really as some say (more routinely known as bdsm but I shorten it to essentials). To my mind, that would be about someone who sheds control and truly gives herself over to another person. What we have instead is someone controlling a fantasy around her. This doesn't preclude it from being good of course but it's worth making the distinction between fetish as piece of theater and vital baring of soul.

But this reveals what the film is actually about and only disguised with erotica. It's about obsessive self, the self that tries to control life, shown as the real barrier that stands in the way of knowing intimacy, reducing life to theater. A petulant ego, as we go on to see, that only expects to be pleased and smothers the other, and the rituals, games, fictions it weaves that keep it from being there for the genuine exchange with another person that sex and love are both ways to manifest. In this way she explores neither herself nor her partner.

And I would go a step further. The big question in both loving intimacy with another person and making a film about it, or really any film that wants to probe the deepest recesses of self, is by what degrees to know and maintain distance, the distance as ambiguity that you honor by refusing to reduce. By what degrees to anticipate and remain open to spontaneity, lead or allow yourself to be led. You can trust that everyone from Tarkovsky to Lynch has mulled over this long and hard, how much to make known even to themselves.

Here there are two reversals of control (over the viewing experience). One in who controls the exchange, and a second about the fictional nature of the exchange. Their effect however is that they leave me with a rather thin reality of petulant abuser and her exasperated enabler. What I have revealed of this world makes me feel that it's not worth staying for.

But knowing his previous work, this is a filmmaker who wants to see with an eye that delves into space to know the feel and cares primarily for what creates visual fabrics. I have him on a short list of talent with the potential to be commanding our attention in the near future.

A very remarkable flow here delves between the woman's thighs, delves through her sex to the box that contains the skeletal remains of what used to be love, and through it to a forlorn walk in the woods that culminates with another box that is the girl swallowing her with suffocating desire.

So he has good intuitions, an eye that reminds me of Europe in the 70s. I hope he grows and takes the leap from being a Juraj Herz or more intelligent Franco into transcendent dreamworlds (as opposed to symbolic). But if he rests here, part of me will be happy all the same, the part of me that favors ethereal wandering. We don't get much of it anymore.

This film offers astonishing photography: soap bubbles look like iridescent lobes, butterflies and moths are presented like stunning neorealist paintings-the pigment scales on wings, delicate antennae, infinitesimal hairs are all rendered with clarity that will elicit gasps. There is also a series of images that morph from one of the protagonists into a cloud of fluttering butterflies of variegated hues segueing into what might be the greatest montage ever edited. Super closeups of wings flash at increasing speed, leaving the viewer overwhelmed by beauty. Complimenting the superb entomological photography are sweeping shots of lush gardens and vine covered chateau walls. We're this not enough, the interiors in soft intimate lighting would earn due praise.

And praise the film has garnered with many top critics assigning The Duke of Burgundy perfect scores. Yet with the feast of visual delights the film serves a story that is as dull as a tarnished penny. The lesbian couple repeat a kind of ritualized dominant and submissive behavior scene after scene with scant variation. The encounters are separated by repetitious scenes of entomology lectures.

The only portion of this movie that breaks the wearying dreary repetition is a visit to a woman who crafts fetish devices. This breaks the monotony, but it's difficult not to laugh during an exchange. When the submissive partner is disappointed to exasperation at learning that the equipment she desires cannot be fabricated in time for her birthday, an alternative is suggested. The character flashes with delight of the substitution: "how about human toilet?" The sensual scenes are my no measure engaging or erotic. Sure, the filmmaker is presenting the subject in a manner that forbids prurient interest. But it's difficult to think of a film in which the physical expression of affection is so boring. The relationship is static until the very end when one of the women becomes overwrought for reasons that the audience is unable to divine.

The exhilarating beauty of the photography serves to point up the colorless plot.

All due respect to Knudsen, she almost saved the movie and it was only worth watching for her. However movie as a movie... Waste of time! Complete waste of time.

Forget 9 1/2 Weeks, forget Last Tango in Paris, forget Secretary and most definitely forget 50 Shades, this is THE definitive cinematic essay on a dom/sub relationship.

The idea is a fascinating and brave one: to create an homage to artistic elements of the "disreputable" sexploitation movies of the 1970s and make it beautiful and profound. It's another movie that full of references to other movies and to the movie-making process. I recognised only little hints of Just Jaekin, being unfamiliar with the other influences. I did spot the marker tape on the carpet that serve two purposes, practical and metaphorical. Er.. three, there are two metaphors going on, I think, one plot-related and one post- modern commentary.

Talking of plot, it is so slight that it could be explained in three sentences. I won't, obviously, but honestly it wouldn't matter if I did. What matters is the manner of the telling.

The story inhabits a strange dream-like space where everyone in the town is a fetishistic female entomologist! (If anyone can explain the significance of the entomology, please do, I'm all ears!) But within the unreal external world, the two heroines inhabit an emotional world that is utterly believable.

In sumptuous but slightly muted autumn colours, the film looks gorgeous. I found it sensual, very erotic (despite there being no more than a few seconds of anything you could call "sex" and no nudity at all), emotionally engaging, warm, sad, funny and REAL.

Although the story deals exclusively with dominance and submission (no trace of S&M despite what it says in all the publicity, including in interviews with the director) it is a universal story about conflicting desires, fantasies, trust and compromise. In some way, it is a story for every relationship.

I absolutely loved this film.

Titled after a butterfly native to Britain, this intense drama focuses on a romantic relationship between two entomologists that begins to crumble as their role playing takes an emotional strain on the woman forced to play dominant by her masochistic girlfriend. Lusciously photographed, with several shots that slowly travel up and down butterfly displays, and beginning with opening credits in the fashion of a late 1960s or early 1970s movie, 'The Duke of Burgundy' is a visually arresting experience and the detailed costumes are impressive too. The film also benefits from a lack of exposition; at first, the submissive woman appears to the dominant's maid and our preconceptions are further challenged as it is slowly revealed that the submissive one has all control in the relationship, often uncomfortably coaxing her lover into improvising speeches and punishments to help her achieve satisfaction. Interesting as all this might sound, the completely non-explicit way that their interactions are filmed takes away much of the intimacy with no nudity and precious few moments of them close together. The repetitiveness of their routines also grows tiresome, if somewhat appropriately so to reflect the dominant one's disenchantment with their affair. Certainly, there is enough of interest here to make the film worth a look, but one's mileage will probably vary.

The technical characteristics of the film were wonderful. In the beginning of the movie, I was immediately captured by the beautiful cinematography and soundscape.

However, what I expected from this movie was an exploration of intermittent reinforcement in relationships.

I could have enjoyed this movie a lot more if it had a deeper insight into the sexuality of the two women, instead of playing out as the beginning of a BDSM porn movie.

One good quote of the movie is capable to sum up one of the characters' psyche completely: "Oh, if we could all just say 'Pinastri' to end our torments."

(Pinastri being their safe word)

My first stop at the London Film Festival. Coming hot off the heels off ecstatic buzz from a minority at the Toronto Film Festival, Peter Strickland's Berberian Sound Studio followup The Duke of Burgundy is a tantalising study of the power struggle between a sado-masochistic lesbian couple. The story focuses on their sexual role-play relationship, starting at an ambiguous point and continuing on until the cracks begin to show as inevitable diminishing returns develop. While the first act sets the seed and plays it straightforwardly, the second act completely subverts everything we've seen in a fascinating way. While we at first believe their bond is more organic, it's revealed that a lot more is planned than we thought, and those boundaries continue to reveal themselves. While their sex lives are quite unique, or rather niche to a certain community, it's universally relatable to the demands, desires and generosity of the relationships in our own lives. What's most notable about the film is the two tones it switches between. Sometimes it can be ominous and deeply sensual while it explores the ritualistic but tender fetishism, conjuring a tense atmosphere quite like this year's Under The Skin or certain scenes of Mulholland Drive. This mostly derives from the mood setting music. But between those scenes it has an oddball sense of humour. It's a grounded and dry humour, one where we're laughing at them for their sexual quirks rather than with them. The film even has a perfume credit at the beginning, winking at us, while the rest of the film takes itself dead seriously. It's a bizarre mix, but its consistency makes it the personality of the film even if it doesn't always blend well together. It can be quite funny when you get into it and most of that comes from the subtlety of the performances while the somber and erotic tone comes from Strickland's zealous stylisation. Unfortunately, Danish actress Sidse Babett Knudsen is unbearable in the first act. She's overly stilted and unnatural. However, as it's revealed that the quirks in her performance are deliberate, she begins to peel back the layers and sensitivity in her character and steals the show with just the acting in her eyes. Co-lead Chiara D'Anna gives ample support, being able to do a lot with very little, slyly showing her delicate and quietly sinister part of her character. It's a cold film, one concerned with artificial superficialities rather than depth and emotion, best illustrated when Knudsen's character begins to wear loose fitted pyjamas rather than alluring clothing. As such, the story and characters are told entirely through their sex and foreplay rather than anything else. It often feels skin-deep. With its exclusively female cast almost in isolation, it's hard to ignore that the film and its sex scenes are seen through the male gaze of writer/director, rather than an authentic representation of what these relationships are most likely like. But even so, it is an interesting study of them with that in mind, moreso for their representation on film and the choices Strickland makes. Why is it when the rest of the film is so stern that when the characters express desires for a human toilet for their birthday that it's shown as funny? Why did Strickland choose to present it in this way and break the dreamy spell of the rest of the film? It appears to show a level of discomfort with his own characters and it thusly makes them difficult to embrace. It's best off when the film focuses on its amatory moments, even if they're ones of fantasy. Fortunately, it's a very well produced film with rich production and lighting design that deftly combat the too-sharp-for-my-tastes contemporary cinematography. It's got quite a Gothic feel, one with period (the time and setting aren't clear, but it seems modern and English) and European sensibilities, especially with the score. The sound design is expectedly intricate and intimate, coming from this director of Berberian Sound Studio, at least. However, it's weak in the abstract moments. It never really justifies what moths have to do with the film, except being the profession of one of its leads and its namesake. It has attractive imagery no doubt, with a couple references to Stan Brahkage's experimental short Mothlight, but it's not very thematically inspiring. Although the film is often quite engaging and intriguing, its pacing and tunnel vision with the inherent repetition involved lead it to drag more than it should have and there were many times in its final twenty minutes when I thought it was going to end. It didn't really need to do much more. With a more confident director The Duke of Burgundy could have been something more special, rather than being a Mulholland Drive lite in a few aspects. Although it can be graphic, it's relatively mild compared to what it could have been, not that it needed more than the suggestions it gives. Just could have been handled in a better way. It should have at least committed to either of its two dark and light tones. However, there's a lot to admire here, especially with the bold performances, and it does raise interesting ideas about the dynamics of control in relationships and sexual satisfactions. It'll still find its small patch of passionate fans, but it does as much progress for LGBT relationships in cinema as Blue Is The Warmest Colour, for better and worse." 7/10

This is frustrating because I felt like I had so much to say about the film as it was going on but now I can't find the words. The directing here is spellbinding. That is really the one word to describe it. It's so sensual and seductive, so enigmatic and impenetrable. The directing transforms everything else around it. Sidse Babett Knudsen is also absolutely spectacular. Throughout most of it she carries the film with just her face, and that's all she needs to make us understand. She deserves awards attention, for sure.

Unfortunately, when I said that the directing was spellbinding, it is... but there's a certain disconnect between it and the screenplay. Thematically, the film is strong (sort of), but narratively, it's also incredibly repetitive and drawn out. No doubt Strickland's direction strengthens the film quite a lot, as does Knudsen, and while visually there are so many things to marvel at, the direction almost gets away with hiding its flaws... almost. When the film isn't drawing out its inevitable conclusion (which, in terms of the last shot, was completely predictable) it sort of feels oddly melodramatic (without ever really going big) and sort of soapy. I enjoyed the film, no doubt, but the longer it went on the bigger a disconnect I felt between its various aspects. Still, I see this getting a lot of passionate fans (and dissenters) from both sides. I'm definitely in the positive side, although it really deserved to be so much better as a whole

Like I have said often a well made movie is not always a good one. That's the case here. This movie was well directed and has beautiful images and scenes. The two main performers do an excellent job and the sound track has got gorgeous music. But what does the Duke of Burgundy in the middle of all that in terms of plot? In fact there is no plot at all. What we watch is the relationship between mistress and servant (slave) that turns out at certain moments into a lesbian love relationship. The story is terefore quite uninteresting though that lesbian relationship js powerfully intense sometimes in erotic terms.

This is a profound and engrossing film. Peter Strickland is clearly less a fan of cinema than a fanatic for film and there is a difference. He believes that film does not depict reality but is a reproduction of reality and therein lies his fascination. He is excited by this process and through his films similarly excites us. In this film, ostensibly about a couple of ladies living out a BDSM relationship in a rambling old mansion, his filmic inspiration is Stan Brakhage. Brakhage, who died only a few years back. experimented with film all his life, and was introduced to me many, many years ago as I sat in a mattress strewn room, four floors up in an otherwise derelict building in Camden. One of Brakhage's early films was Mothlight (1963) and was made without the use of a camera, by pressing the wings of moths into the negative that was then projected giving and unworldly effect that was not unlike staring at a light surrounded by fluttering moths. Strickland replicates this wonderfully in a sensational dream sequence in his film and is the reason for the insects featuring so prominently. As in his previous films, Strickland is as fascinated with sound as much as picture and here the soundtrack is punctuated with the scratchings and flutterings of butterflies and moths, the purring of the cat and a madam snoring. With so many visual and aural treats we sometimes tend to lose focus on the two ladies but are soon brought back by another twist in the tale. On the face of it this tale of a dom and a sub should be simple enough to tell but the director takes his time to establish the exact tone he wants so we can accept as 'true' what we see before us, even as it changes before our very eyes. As you may have gathered from my rambling, this is no ordinary film and the expected, bare flesh and lashings do not appear but plenty more does, more or less on screen, including the 'human toilet' and a fantastic masturbatory sequence with verbal instructions. So, to conclude, for me Strickland has done it again, a wonderful film, almost out of nothing as he allows his love of 'this unexplored corner of cinema that is still seen as disreputable' (principally, giallo and sexploitation) to colour his vision (and sound) for our delight.

This movie tries to be so many things, and fails at all, the one thing it excels at is being a complete waste of time.

The people writing good reviews for this film are either somehow affiliated with it, or truly have no idea what a decent movie is.

The entire movie is based on little scripts the two women rehearse, and there is maybe three of them, and then it's a simple matter of 'rinse and repeat'.

I have NO IDEA why the director thought that a woman peeing into another woman's mouth would be in any way appealing to anyone, apart of course for those out there that are extremely kinky, of course you don't see this, thank god for that, but you do hear it.

As I mentioned the movie just repeats itself over and over again until it ends, it's just utter crap, and there are moments in the film where there is insanely annoying sounds with obscure images in the background, it's like the director/editors had completely run out of ideas and put these bits in to simply make the movie longer, of course they would have been doing us all a favor had they simply left them out, or better still, never made the movie in the first place.

ABSOLUTE GARBAGE!.

This film stayed with me for ages after watching it, probably due to the great soundtrack!

I can understand why this movie is so highly regarded by critics. But deep down, I'm just your average movie enthusiast that still loves stupid movies with badass guys shooting bad guys with big guns. Sure there are time I'm really into some cult movies, but they are cult for a reason and that's because most people don't enjoy them, because most people love stupid movies with badass guys shooting bad guys with big guns. It's unfair, but that's how it goes. When watching The Duke of Burgundy I never expected it to be a mainstream movie, but even so I can't help feeling let down. However, let me start by what's good in this movie: The first thing I noticed was the atmosphere. Dark but ironically so, colorful. The slow unravel of the relationship's intricacies and, yet again, slow build up to the inevitable emotional breakdown, were carefully crafted, that is obvious talent right there. Nevertheless, personally, it failed to deliver the emotional impact it promised, leaving no lasting impressions or afterthoughts on the subject the movie was centered on. There was a surreal dream sequence that, in my opinion, did not fit the movie, and even if you can have an interpretation out of it, it felt misplaced and pretentious. On some levels, this movie reminded me of Shame, but where shame got it right, this one felt bland and unclear. As far as enjoyment goes, this movie failed me. It was boring. Good but boring.

I was unimpressed by Peter Stickland's previous film Berberian Sound Studio so the only reason I wanted to see this film was because it starred Sidse Babett Knudson. So let me be honest and get this point out of the way – despite the fact this film features no nudity, I found it very erotic. I then asked myself how would a female viewer assess this film and went looking for an answer. Checking the linked critics review on IMDb revealed that there are very few reviews by female critics (that applies to all films not just this one) which certainly gives pause for thought in itself. Of those female critics most gave it an average to excellent rating and did not on the whole consider the film to be exploitative. Jennifer Drewett from I'm With Geek raised the question "how can a lesbian film directed by a man come out without pandering to the male gaze?" before going on to praise the film.

My view is that this film does in part pander to the male gaze and indeed it should given the director set out to make a homage to 1970s Euro-sleaze films albeit filtered through an artistic aesthetic. In fact it's more effective than modern porn because, as in a good horror film, the more explicit material is only implied and occurs off screen. I don't want to labour the point but I do think some other writers have avoided the question of its eroticism or, in some cases, even denied that it is erotic at all.

Putting the question of eroticism to bed (pun intended), how about the other elements of the film? The homage/pastiche elements of the film are done perfectly – anyone who has ever seen a 70s European sexploitation film will immediately recognise the stylised titles, the breathy soundtrack, the use of smoke and mirrors to imply you are seeing more than is actually displayed on screen. But deeper than this is a vision that incorporates these techniques into a beautifully realised and exquisitely lit and filmed world of its own which is internally consistent and appealing. The music and sound design are outstanding, the acting is excellent, the dream sequences better realised than almost anything you could compare them with.

The other thing about the film is that it is often laugh out loud funny. Some of the musings and the meetings of the entomological society are absurd and hilarious. The end credits are particularly funny. The humour ensures a good balance of light and shade throughout the film.

Some viewers will, I am sure, find this film pretentious in the way that I found Berberian Sound Studio to be pretentious. For me though Strickland has here found a perfect balance of the mysterious, the beautiful and the erotic. It also passes the test of being a film that I keep thinking about days later, unlike most modern films whose details I forget the minute I leave the cinema.