Rating: 
Summary: The Black Dahlias
Review: Claude Chabrol's "La Fleur du Mal" is as tightly structured as a Moliere comedy or a Shakespeare drama: nothing is left to chance, everything is accounted for, from the lampshade in a home office to the neatly stacked and folded shirts packed in a suitcase. Chabrol is also fastidious about his mise en scene: from the décor and the photography to the clothing and jewelry.
Chabrol has focused his microscope on a family, riddled with the sins of their ancestors that once again come to the forefront in the form of a hate letter aimed at the mother, Anne (Nathalie Baye) during her bid for mayor in a small French provincial town. It's the middle class, the Bourgeoisie that Chabrol views with contempt here: their insistence on sweeping things under the carpet, their not talking about things better discussed and their fascination with those with more money and a better lineage.
Despite the fact that most of these people are pretty despicable, guilty of the worst kind of betrayal, "La Fleur du Mal" is nonetheless fascinating to watch as Chabrol pieces his story together, layering scene upon scene, dissecting and surgically removing all the false faces and peeling away the fake smiles.
Benoit Magimel (The object of Isabelle Huppert's affection in "The Piano Teacher") as Francois and Melanie Doutey as Michele add sexual heat to the surroundings and also a clear dislike for what is going on. But I think Suzanne Flon as the eldest member of the family is the one who really holds the film together: her portrayal of Tante Line has seen it all, literally and has used her experience wisely by turning it into wisdom not archness or conceit.
"La Fleur du Mal" is Chabrol at his best, at his smartest, at his shrewdest and as such begs viewing by anyone interested in Contemporary film.
Rating: 
Summary: When A Rose Is Not A Rose
Review: Claude Chabrol's new film "The Flower of Evil" easily ranks among the master's (and he is a master film-maker) best works. The territory may not seem new but there's something refreshing about that. Because we, Chabrol fans know he knows this genre very well. As time has gone by Chabrol has not lost his touch. "The Flower of Evil" marks Chabrol's 50th film! His first was "Le Serge Beau" (1958). For over 40 years Chabrol has been wooing French audiences with his Hitchcockian style of film-making starting the famous French New-Wave. In fact "The Flower of Evil" is one Chabrol's favorite films of his own. The other is "The Story of Women". Within the past year or so I've become a very big enthusiast of Chabrol's work. I loved his last film "Merci pour le Chocolat". I thought that was a wonderful throwback to his ealier days and films like "Le Boucher" & "Les Biches". But, I have to admit, I enjoyed "Flower of Evil" just the slighest bit more. There is so much to savor here. The wonderful way the screenplay (written by Caroline Eliacheff, Louise L. Lambrichs, and Chabrol himself) weaves so many themes at once but in a way where one idea doesn't seem to over-lap onto another. There are a lot of secrets buried here and Chabrol tells them with great energy. I always feel when dealing with certain stories it's best not to know anything about the film before seeing it. Some movies just need to catch the audience off guard. Play with your senses a bit. For example think of movies like "Psycho", "The Crying Game" and "Mulholland Dr." you really wouldn't want someone revealing the plot to you, would you? Usually mystery films require you know almost nothing about the film before hand. So, in trying to somehow lure you into seeing the movie I can only supply a vague out-line of the film. "The Flower of Evil" starts off with the appearance of a dead body (go figure!). And from that point on are mind starts going to work. Who died? Who killed him? And will the blood leave a stain on the carpet? We meet Francois Vasseur (Benoit Magimel) and his father Gerard (Bernard Lecoq). And soon old family secrets are starting to be revealed. Anne Charpin-Vasseur (Nathalie Baye), now pay attention. She is Francois step-mother. Her first husband and Gerard's first wife died together in a car accident, so logically they married. Now Anne has a daughter Michele (Melanie Doutey) and she seems to have more then sisterly love for her step-brother. But, just so you are warned and you may find it hard to believe, it is not presented in a werid twist way. And naturally I really can't go on any further.
"The Flower of Evil" is one of the year's best films. I hope many others come to enjoy this film as much as I did and not treat it as harshly as they did "Merci pour le Chocolat". Bottom-line: Master film-maker Claude Chabrol's 50th film is one of the very best of his impressive career. Also, one of the best films of the year. Wonderfully written, superbly acted, and stylishly directed.
Rating:
Summary: When A Rose Is Not A Rose
Review: Claude Chabrol's new film "The Flower of Evil" easily ranks among the master's (and he is a master film-maker) best works. The territory may not seem new but there's something refreshing about that. Because we, Chabrol fans know he knows this genre very well. As time has gone by Chabrol has not lost his touch. "The Flower of Evil" marks Chabrol's 50th film! His first was "Le Serge Beau" (1958). For over 40 years Chabrol has been wooing French audiences with his Hitchcockian style of film-making starting the famous French New-Wave. In fact "The Flower of Evil" is one Chabrol's favorite films of his own. The other is "The Story of Women". Within the past year or so I've become a very big enthusiast of Chabrol's work. I loved his last film "Merci pour le Chocolat". I thought that was a wonderful throwback to his ealier days and films like "Le Boucher" & "Les Biches". But, I have to admit, I enjoyed "Flower of Evil" just the slighest bit more. There is so much to savor here. The wonderful way the screenplay (written by Caroline Eliacheff, Louise L. Lambrichs, and Chabrol himself) weaves so many themes at once but in a way where one idea doesn't seem to over-lap onto another. There are a lot of secrets buried here and Chabrol tells them with great energy. I always feel when dealing with certain stories it's best not to know anything about the film before seeing it. Some movies just need to catch the audience off guard. Play with your senses a bit. For example think of movies like "Psycho", "The Crying Game" and "Mulholland Dr." you really wouldn't want someone revealing the plot to you, would you? Usually mystery films require you know almost nothing about the film before hand. So, in trying to somehow lure you into seeing the movie I can only supply a vague out-line of the film. "The Flower of Evil" starts off with the appearance of a dead body (go figure!). And from that point on are mind starts going to work. Who died? Who killed him? And will the blood leave a stain on the carpet? We meet Francois Vasseur (Benoit Magimel) and his father Gerard (Bernard Lecoq). And soon old family secrets are starting to be revealed. Anne Charpin-Vasseur (Nathalie Baye), now pay attention. She is Francois step-mother. Her first husband and Gerard's first wife died together in a car accident, so logically they married. Now Anne has a daughter Michele (Melanie Doutey) and she seems to have more then sisterly love for her step-brother. But, just so you are warned and you may find it hard to believe, it is not presented in a werid twist way. And naturally I really can't go on any further.
"The Flower of Evil" is one of the year's best films. I hope many others come to enjoy this film as much as I did and not treat it as harshly as they did "Merci pour le Chocolat". Bottom-line: Master film-maker Claude Chabrol's 50th film is one of the very best of his impressive career. Also, one of the best films of the year. Wonderfully written, superbly acted, and stylishly directed.
Rating:
Summary: Chabrol it is, Baudelaire it's not...
Review: FLOWER OF EVIL (directed by Claude Chabrol)
Incest that isn't incest is also a theme in Chabrol's latest "La Fleur Du Mal". A brother and a sister, who are engaged in a physical relationship, are siblings due to a marriage and not blood. Again, guilt is so far removed that even their parents had always hoped they would become a couple.
The film starts with the brother returning from a four-year stint in the states. He is picked up by his father who seems to be an affable and simple guy. His stepmother is a local politician who comes across as grossly ambitious pushing her family to the side with the characters vaguely implying at some infidelity with her running mate. His sister, it seems, is attracted to him while he rejects her.
But all this is half-truth as slowly unravels in this light mystery about upper middle class decadence and what they think is communication. There is the mystery in the foreground, in public discussion, about the family's relationship to Nazi collaborators in the past. There is a secondary mystery out of the public eye that becomes the most important about the father, his own motives, and how they grow closer and closer to the family.
Chabrol's influence from Baudelaire, well as a fan of both, I don't really get it. I see this movie, like some of Chabrol's other critiques of the petit-bourgeois, more of an alternate reality that I'm not privy to. It's socialism of the privileged, and it's intriguingly perverse. The incest is safe while alluring. The murder is secondary and unresolved by the films end. The film closes with credits running during a party while a corpse waits unacknowledged. What will become of the characters ends up being unimportant.
In many ways, this is Chabrol at his most sophisticated. The need to move between audience-aimed actions is replaced by built-up realism. The dialog is smart and the uneven story progression seems especially real. He's sacrificed his scathing wit to allow for the characters to organically develop at the limitations of their own wisdom.
Part of the original nouvelle vogue and as important historically as Truffaut and Godard, this is just one part of a larger body of work matching that of Eric Rohmer and Stephen Frears.
(...)
Rating: 
Summary: An insult to intelligent people, as well as the French.
Review: If you think there's a reason for nearly forty used copies of this mess being for sale, there is. This nasty piece of snobbery is based on a play (first reason to avoid), and stereotypes French culture as anti-American and hypocritical. Did I say stereotype? Also, Chabrol needs to refresh his memory as to what plot resolution is. If you must waste an evening (as I did), buy or rent the latest Doctor Who re-release: there's more real culture in five minutes of bad science fiction than in this sham intellectual drek. Touche!
Rating:
Summary: An insult to intelligent people, as well as the French.
Review: If you think there's a reason for nearly forty used copies of this mess being for sale, there is. This nasty piece of snobbery is based on a play (first reason to avoid), and stereotypes French culture as anti-American and hypocritical. Did I say stereotype? Also, Chabrol needs to refresh his memory as to what plot resolution is. If you must waste an evening (as I did), buy or rent the latest Doctor Who re-release: there's more real culture in five minutes of bad science fiction than in this sham intellectual drek. Touche!
Rating:
Summary: Chabrol: The Master Storyteller in Peak Form!
Review: LA FLEUR DU MAL is Claude Chabrol at his best: this is a bizarre, convoluted French mystery told with such finesse and aplomb that it feels more like sitting down to fine French cuisine rather than just viewing another foreign film. But that is exactly what Chabrol is about - respecting the intellect as well as the curious mind and eye. Set in a small town in France a family is slowly revealed to have a mysterious past with interfamilial marrying, murder, strange accidents, and political intrigues. The mother Anne (Nathalie Baye) is running for town council, a career move which the father Gerard (Bernard Lecoq) finds objectionable. Gerard's son Francois (Benoit Magimel) returns from America at the point that his stepmother Anne is campaigning and reunites with his stepsister Michele (Melanie Donley) in a love affair he has tried to avoid, not wanting to carry on the family tradition of 'inter-marrying'. The one sane member of this family is Aunt Line (Suzanne Flon in an epic performance!) who has lived through it all and favors the current romance between Francois and Melanie for reasons that are made clear by story's end. While this tale may sound a bit mundane, in Chabrol's clever hands it slowly develops into a mystery that is so well conceived that it knocks us for a loop. All of the actors are outstanding, the musical score is subtle and right, the filming is impeccable, and the overall effect out-Hitchcock's Hitchcock. For intelligent film making at its finest LA FLEUR DU MAL is a must see. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: An entertaining but unsatisfying film!!!
Review: Overall, The Flower of Evil was a very entertaining movie, but I couldn't have helped and become a little disappointed because of the fantastic trailer. The film was advertised as a very complicated, complex mystery, but it was actually quite simple. The story was a very good one, intriguing and exciting, but it seemed like the writer didn't have any ideas on how to flesh it out and add some mystery to it.
The Flower of Evil tells the tale of a French Bordeaux bourgeoisie family with a family tree like a Los Angeles freeway map and a history of evil doings which doesn't really have anything to do with anything. As this film rolls along with the day-to-day business of the mother running for local civic office while the step-sibs falling in love and granny putters around the garden, one can only wonder what, if anything, is being developed. When the end credits roll unexpectedly one can only wonder what Chabrol had in mind and why it was never really brought into clarity of fruition at the end. The wonderful story seems threadbare and almost nonexistant and the family history seems pointless.
I felt a bit cheated and let down when the film was over, but I wouldn't dismiss it because of that. I really enjoyed the superb acting by the top-notch cast, fine character development, and otherwise gripping story. Maybe some of the subtlety was just lost on me, but I liked the fact that you're never sure who's good or bad, and end up feeling for each character anyway. I am unfamiliar with any of Claude Chabrol's other works, but after seeing this film, I am definitely curious to check out some more. Not sure if I would recommend this, but personally, I thouroughly enjoyed it, as unsatisfying as it was.
Rating:
Summary: very suspenseful movie
Review: really good suspenseful movie that is more exciting than most american mystery movies, except for the a few hitchcock movies. i really enjoyed this one and it's one of a few foreign movies i like.
Rating:
Summary: Not the worst, not the best Chabrol
Review: What saves this film--noticeably weaker than a number of other Chabrol efforts--is the acting. Veteran actress Natalie Baye is superb here, as is the actress playing her Aunt Line, Suzanne Flon. Also notable are Benoit Magimel and Melanie Doutey as the two young lovers. While the actors all turn in solid performances, the plotting and story leave something to be desired. Chabrol specializes in the corruption of the well-to-do and how the lower classes conflict with those above them. This conflict can result in superb filmmaking (La Ceremonie, La Rupture, Les Biches). But this film is decidedly lopsided; with its essentially single focus--corruption and guilt--it lacks the dramatic punch and juice found in the other films cited here. One can explore these themes (guilt and corruption) and certainly generate a powerful piece of drama. But Chabrol seems to be comfortable when they are inextricably tied to class conflict and when they are not, as is true here, he does not dig deep enough to make these themes as strong as they should have been to elicit real emotional intensity. What we have instead is cinema that slickly skates on the surface of these two related issues--corruption and guilt--without really plunging into the basis, the repercussions, the intricate complications they can generate. Without revealing too much, a woman running for mayor focuses on getting out the vote, while her lecherous husband goes after young women--two in particular. Meanwhile, the husband's son--recently returned from America--and the wife's daughter (the husband and wife are each on a second marriage; hence the two younger people are half-siblings) fall hard for each other. Add to that a dark secret the woman's aunt has kept to herself for decades and there's the elements of the plot. The climax is weak because the momentum generated is just not sufficient to result in any real emotional payoff. One of the above characters may receive his/her just desserts, but they don't count for much because there is essentially a humdrum development on display here. Too bad. If Chabrol had added his signature element of class conflict he could have subverted the essentially superficial sheen of the film as it is with enough push and pull to make it really interesting. One can still admire it for the actors but not as a thrilling piece of dramatic cinema.
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