THE FLOWER OF EVIL Rating: (out of 5 stars) Director: Claude Chabrol Producer: Marin Karmitz Writers: Caroline Eliacheff, Louise L. Lambrichs Director of Photography: Eduardo Serra Cast: Nathalie Baye, Benoit Magimel, Suzanne Flon, Bernard Le Coq, Melanie Doutey, Thomas Chabrol Visit the IMDB page for full cast and crew.

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Review by: Laurel Williams
10/7/03

Masterful French director Claude Chabrol's The Flower of Evil is his fiftieth film. You may know him from his other films, Merci Pour Le Chocolat, The Eye of Vichy, or The Cousins -- I certainly don't. Yes, I feel it's my duty to forewarn you that I haven't seen any of Chabrol's other films and therefore cannot swear in court that Chabrol is a "master" of French Cinema, though I won't dispute he's prolific. Like other "great" French films though, The Flower of Evil elicited from me nothing but a feeling of ambivalence.

The Flower of Evil starts with the return home of young Francois Vasseur (Benoit Magimel) after an absence of several years. He's greeted by his father, Gerard Vasseur (Bernard Le Coq), who is upset about his step-mother, Anne Charpin-Vasseur (Nathalie Baye), running in a local election. Gerard isn't very supportive of Anne, and is regularly sleeping with other women. Also waiting for Francois are Anne's elderly Aunt Line (Suzanne Flon) and his step-sister, Michele Charpin (Melanie Doutey), a beautiful college student who seems to have a special attachment to Francois.

At first that seems okay -- I mean, they were ex-step-siblings in Clueless and that was fine. But then you learn that Francois and Michele are also first cousins because Anne's sister was Francois' mother. First cousins in love is a little more creepy, but once acceptable among royalty and rednecks. But then it's hinted at that Francois and Michele are actually half-siblings -- because Francois' mom was having an affair with Michele's dad. Now, call me crazy, but that seems like incest to me. Yet in this film it is painted as completely natural and incredibly romantic. In fact, we learn that Aunt Line once was terribly in love with her own brother as well, and then was somehow involved with her father's death after he betrayed her brother terribly.

So it becomes pretty clear that the young lovers are in some way following a pattern of incest that has been set in this family. Will their destiny be the same as Aunt Line's? Or perhaps like Anne and Gerard's marriage? Do we really care? The director and the screenwriters seem determined to make their point even if the story and the characters they've created don't quite line up with it. After a while, events become completely manipulated and the story becomes melodramatic. The message and theme of the piece override the story, and I'm left feeling completely detached and uninterested.

(A Palm Pictures release. Opens in New York on October 10, 2003, and in Los Angeles on October 17, 2003. Expands to more cities at later dates.)