Femme fatale

Language : English / French

Year of release : 2002

Run time : 1h55min

Genre : Mystery / Thriller

Cast : Antonio Banderas, Rebecca Romijn, Peter Coyote

Director : Brian de Palma

The movie opens with a scene in which Laurie,a thief,is watching an old Hollywood movie. Her boss enters her hotel room,and asks her to get dressed,as they are at the Festival de Cannes,where they need to steal the diamond jewels 'Eye of the Serpent'.

 

On the red carpet,Laurie poses as a photographer,and catches the eye of the woman wearing the diamonds ( a sort of revealing corset shaped like a snake). She goes into the ladies room,and the bejeweled woman follows her in there. They make out in a booth,while her boss is taking the jewelry Laurie throws on the floor,replacing them with fakes.

In order to get out they cut the power to the theatre the festival is held at. Laurie double crosses her boss,takes the jewels and runs to Paris.

In Paris she is spotted by a paparazzo who takes her picture. She meets a mysterious woman,who seems to be the one who was wearing the jewels.

Laurie enters a church,where people have a funeral,and an older couple call her Lili, and chase after her.

One of the men she double crossed finds her,and throws her off the hotel balcony. Luckily,she falls on top of plastic bags,and survives. The old couple find her. They take her to Lili's place.

Lili is a woman who looks just like her, who's husband and child died,and the house is full of flowers and 'Sorry for your loss' cards. She finds Lili's passport and plane ticket.

While she's having a bath, Lili comes home and kills herself.

Laurie leaves for the USA and meets a rich man on the plane.

 

7 years later, the rich man is an US ambassador to France and his wife is a mystery,as she doesn't like to have her picture taken.

The same paparazzo takes the challenge to take her picture,and takes her picture.

Laurie's boss is freed from prison,and sees Laurie's picture displayed on street announcements of magazines.

This makes Laurie take drastic measures and start a cat and mouse game with the paparazzo.

To me this is a psychological thriller, as I think, Lili,after the loss of her family experienced a serious trauma, and wanted to be someone else, so she blocked out her pain, becoming Laurie.

Brian de Palma has directed a lot of movies in this genre,and I think this is exactly what this is. In fact,the scene in which Lili comes home,and Laurie watches her,hiding from her,feels more like a memory,as she seems to be still in the bathtub,dreaming. The way the scene was directed reminds me of the way he directed similar scenes in Obsession and Sisters.

The movie she is watching at the beginning of the movie matches what she is going through. There's something else on tv,while she's in Lili's house,saying something about deja vu,about seeing your future, on the streets there are posters with the writing Deja Vue.

The movie is littered with hints about what's happening.

The movie is filmed in the Brian de Palma style with the split screen,showing the characters shot from different angles,or two characters doing different things.

 

Viewer discretion is advised,as the movie contains nudity and mature language.

The movie received mixed reviews from critics, and was a box office flop, grossing 16.8 million dollars against a budget of 35 million.

 

The movie is for rent / sale on Fetch.

Rating : Worth a watch !