{"id":5016,"date":"2016-12-14T18:38:54","date_gmt":"2016-12-14T23:38:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/?p=5016"},"modified":"2023-12-09T11:20:19","modified_gmt":"2023-12-09T16:20:19","slug":"the-bridesmaid-2004","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/?p=5016","title":{"rendered":"The Bridesmaid-2004"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Bridesmaid-2004<\/strong><\/p>\n

Director Claude Chabrol<\/strong><\/p>\n

Starring Benoit Magimel, Laura Smet<\/strong><\/p>\n

Scott’s Review #548<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Reviewed December 14, 2016<\/p>\n

Grade: B+<\/strong><\/p>\n

A more modern offering by Claude Chabrol, (many of his films were made in the 1960s and 1970s), his 2004 film entitled, The Bridesmaid, continues the tradition of compelling, macabre, story-telling immersing the viewer in strange behavior by the central characters, as they obsess over each other in one way or another.<\/p>\n

The film is in the French language.<\/p>\n

The Bridesmaid contains two plots- one explored fully, the other not explored as much as might have been hoped- the latter being the more interesting of the two.<\/p>\n

Philippe is the only son of his mother, Christine, and the only male in the household- his two other sisters live there as well. Christine is divorced and works as a hairdresser.<\/p>\n

The family is a rather typical one save for a creepy incestuous bond between Philippe and Christine-very romantic in their conversations with each other, and Philippe’s penchant for carrying around a head statue carved to resemble his mother.<\/p>\n

He regularly sleeps with the statue and kisses it on the lips.<\/p>\n

As the youngest daughter is to be married, Philippe meets and bonds with one of the bridesmaids- Senta. The two embark on a torrid love affair and become inseparable. As their love flourishes, Senta becomes obsessive in her undying love for Philippe and asks him to kill a stranger as a way of proving his love for her.<\/p>\n

This leads to confusion as Senta kills another character, thinking this is what Philippe wants. Philippe becomes both afraid and titillated by the young girl.<\/p>\n

The main plot is very reminiscent of the Hitchcock classic, Strangers on a Train, as one party is bloodthirsty and the other a more innocent victim of the plot, yet in Chabrol’s film, the other party suffers from issues of their own in the emotional sense.<\/p>\n

Senta is unbalanced, and a mysterious figure from her past- Rita- described as her stepmother, appears a few times, as she dances with her much younger partner.<\/p>\n

A local girl mysteriously disappears early on in the film, which may be a red herring to the stories, or perhaps related to all the events of the film.<\/p>\n

I was more intrigued by the mommy\/son angle, but perhaps that is Chabrol’s way of confusing the audience. Oddly, the duo has simmering chemistry, yet each character never fesses up to being obsessed with the other- it is merely implied.<\/p>\n

Philippe dislikes Christine’s beau, who figures prominently in the main story of Senta’s machinations, but I wanted more of Christine and Philippe.<\/p>\n

Stylistically, The Bridesmaid is dreamy and builds at a slow momentum, similar to Chabrol’s earlier films- we are aware that the story will play out in a strange, interesting fashion, but we do not always know just what road Chabrol might take, nor what plot points may or may not be revealed.<\/p>\n

Perhaps less developed than some of his fantastic earlier efforts, but a recommended watch for someone in the mood for a morbid, left of center, story to sink one’s teeth into.<\/p>\n

Claude Chabrol is a director I admire greatly for his use of fascinating elements that keep the audience guessing as to what is coming next, and this is a joy in itself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Bridesmaid-2004 Director Claude Chabrol Starring Benoit Magimel, Laura Smet Scott’s Review #548 Reviewed December 14, 2016 Grade: B+ A more modern offering by Claude Chabrol, (many of his films were made in the 1960s and 1970s), his 2004 film entitled, The Bridesmaid, continues the tradition of compelling, macabre, story-telling immersing the viewer in strange … Continue reading The Bridesmaid-2004<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[317,652,442,35,265,204],"tags":[318,651,443,67,266,258],"class_list":["post-5016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2004-movie-reviews","category-claude-chabrol","category-french-films","category-foreignfilms","category-foreign-thrillers","category-thrillers","tag-2004-movie-reviews","tag-claude-chabrol","tag-french-films","tag-foreign-language-films","tag-foreign-thrillers","tag-thrillers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5016"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19581,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5016\/revisions\/19581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottsfilmreviews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}