User reviews

This film does not certainly break new grounds but it takes us back to the good old days when they took enough time to write a story (and/or to choose a good writer:Patricia Highsmith,Boileau-Narcejac,here Donald E. Westlake).

An user has already pointed out how the film borrowed from "strangers on a train" .François Cluzet and Bernard Giraudeau give terrific performances.I agree with the user who wrote that Karine Viard's behavior did not make much sense at the end of the movie,but I do not think it's the actress's fault.The S/M scene using Marie Laforet's "Viens Viens" is also a big mistake,the words to the song having nothing to do with what happens on the screen.

But if you want to see a great French actor,just watch Giraudeau.

NB: if the film may sometimes seem incoherent to you, particularly the evolution of the character acted by Karin Viard, blame it on a butchered editing. The original film lasted about two hours and a half.

I have been very disappointed seeing that film. The story of a man who is a writer, who usually writes thrillers, on the edge of disaster, who asks another writer with no publisher to share the benefits of a mutual writing. Having to involve a perfect murder like they usually write was a good idea, it was just not well developed. Moreover, the emphasis on the overexposure of the images is ad nauseam. The violence, the blood, the sadistic attitudes of the characters might have been in the book (which I admit I did not read) but it did not show well on the big screen. There could have been good ideas, the performance as an actor of Bernard Giraudeau as Brice Kantor is undeniably good; he has this ability to play all kinds of characters and this one might not be his best but he excels in playing the bad guy. Karin Viard is yet again a bad actress, when she gets angry, it is just not credible; and François Cluzet should stay with Chabrol when he accepts his films.

Ben meets former colleague Brice in a train station book-shop. Ben is a down-on-his-luck writer with a manuscript but no publisher, Brice is a rich & successful author, but has writer's block due to his current marital problems. Brice devises a plan that will benefit both of them - however, it will only work if his estranged wife is out of the picture. Ben initially rejects the idea, but after divulging the plan to his strangely intrigued wife, he is persuaded to commit the murder. So begins his descent into hell, with enough Hitchcockian references and moments of black humour to keep this jaded film-goer happy. Film does lose its way a bit in the last two reels, but basically held my interest for its 100 minutes.A delicious thriller.