To be honest, I don’t understand why this movie has so many positive reviews. Maybe I didn’t understand the whole ' depth ' picture, but when you look exactly did not notice anything masterpiece. I will say more: the film disappointed me, but about everything in order.
The picture tells the viewer about the life of two mistresses. One studies moths, the other is her maid. It would seem like a creative combination, you can get something interesting, but no. The characters are completely faded and uninteresting. Between them there is no chemistry, enthusiasm, attraction and passion. History does not develop in any way, and in the end something does not defy logic.
Many people compare this film with the film ' The Life of Adele' but I find it absurd. Remember why the audience liked Adele: for the interaction of the characters and their subsequent disclosure, for a good performance of the title actresses, for an interesting shooting and sex scenes in great abundance. What's in this movie? Acting work is faded. The interaction of the main characters does not look alive. I can only mention the performance of Sidse Babett Knudsen, she looks confident in the frame, she is charismatic and pleasant to watch, and she clearly stands out from other actors. Otherwise, nothing worthwhile. The story is absolutely uninteresting, there are no sex scenes. Better to watch 'Defiance' where the duet of two Rachel only one scene will cover the whole film. The same ' Life of Adele' looks much more lively and interesting, and there is something to see. I can compare this film with another film - the film 'Ammonite'. It also tells the story of the love of two girls, one of whom has an interesting hobby. But even in comparison, ' Ammonite' wins almost every aspect.
That's what you can really praise the picture for, is for the camera work. The operator tries to present interesting angles, creates close contact with the main characters, uses interesting spans. And in general, it is clear that the operator does not eat his bread in vain.
It is also possible to pay respect to the composer. He did his job hurriedly. The film leaves almost no scene where music and various melodies would not sound. Thanks to his work, the necessary atmosphere is created in the scenes, which makes it not so pleasant to watch.
There is nothing to praise the film for. Viewers waiting for an interesting story, character development and chemistry between them will be disappointed. Those who are going to see interesting erotic scenes will also be deprived.
In the end, ' Duke of Burgundy' in itself an uninteresting film in which you can see and hear only the good work of the operator and composer. Movies for one time, just to get acquainted.
I decided to listen to the recommendations and study the top of the most uncomfortable romantic films. Tenth on the list and first in order of reading was Peter Strickland’s Duke of Burgundy. I met the name of this director for the first time and did not expect anything from his work, so I kept my perception fresh and enjoyed it a lot. In my imagination, the title of the film hinted at the secrets of French castles and promised a plot like the one in the Dumas Club. It's very good that I was wrong. I think the title is one of the director’s tricks. Because the discrepancy between it and what is happening on the screen immediately activates the audience interest and keeps in suspense. True, even after watching everything to the end, I did not crack this nut (but there must have been a lead somewhere!). Yes, the film has frames with hundreds of pierced butterflies (and the Duke of Burgundy may be among them), yes, everything and everyone blows aristocratic sophistication ... or maybe the action takes place in Burgundy (where it was once located). Much more has been said about the bears. That is, why it is the “Duke of Burundi”, and not any other bug – I do not understand.
On the other hand, without the entomological background, the tape would lose its attractiveness. I read references to The Collector, to The Silence of the Lambs, to the delirium of the mentally ill, in which insects are hallucinatory embodiments of psychosis. Psycho. Psyche... Soul... It is also often depicted as a light butterfly. Perhaps the thing is that everything is “on the surface”, and insects here really symbolize the souls of people. There are so many of them, they seem similar, but when you look closer, you see the differences in shades, in the pattern and shape of the wings. Some of the specimens were carried along the roads and collected nectar in the dust, but some are rare baroque uniques from mysterious impassable thickets. Our fantasies are also butterflies that we want to catch, kill and pin to the cork board with a pin. So fragile and defenseless against reality. Each new game of our heroines is the same butterfly, beautiful, but doomed. Cynthia feels the breakdown more acutely, while passionate Evelyn revels in her dreams. Women are about the same age, but if Cynthia is a balanced and mature personality (at least before she was brought to a nervous breakdown), then her friend is a large child who has difficulty restraining her impulses and despotic commands the “adults” around. And this drama of the collision of fairy tales with reality unfolds right before our eyes in the amazing, “live”, scenery of an ancient mansion.
Special thanks for the work of the sound engineer and operator. The music in the film is pleasant, enveloping, sounds - any - are also served as music. I like that there are no roughnesses and sharp transitions, that unobtrusive vocals are easily interrupted by juicy, rusty and heel-popping silence. I like the visual range, attention to detail, especially the texture of fabrics and clothes. And the way in the scene with the foot massage, it turned out to convey the sound of touching the fingers to the capron ... And the way the garden rustles and chirps outside the walls of the mansion. And how the doors creak, how the skirts rustle... Moderate fetishism is a good addition to any film. I always rejoice when an artist creates the illusion that the world he created is even more material than mine.
Fans of hyperreal action tape is likely to seem long and plotless. The heroes have no external motivation. No one attacks, no one needs to be rescued, no treasure or monsters, no murder, no investigation. Or rather, everything is – but it happens in the heads and hearts of heroines. One of the differences between the so-called “arthouse” cinema and commercial cinema is the rejection of plot moves lying on the surface. Not much is told directly, but the more we can read between the lines. Sidse Babett Knudsen and Chiara D’Anna’s play fits perfectly into this concept: subtle, deep, psychological. I would also like to mention the episode in which a beautiful mortar (Fatma Mohamad) fascinates Evelyn - this is a real dance of butterflies. Hands wings one, and eyes - the other.
The ending of the film leaves open the question: can reality and fantasy be reconciled and who will subordinate whom (or love will soften and balance everything?). Alas, in life, building relationships, we often do not find the answer to this question.
After two other notable work Peter Strickland even knew what to expect from 'The Duke of Burgundy' in which, as it turned out, there are absolutely no men, but generally male characters, and two fervent heroines no one interfered with special love pleasures. One might even wonder: how do two sexy women under the same roof do what they want, and no one shushes them? It turns out so. Seriously, why show another heavy drama about how a same-sex couple lives hard in Puritan society, when you can cook a wonderful brew for aesthetes?
With this can not argue, the movie really turned out sensual, alluring, poetic, beautiful, juicy, exciting. Nicely devoid of inappropriate vulgarity and too pretentious chic. A postcard film, as if descended from shaky photos that captured the charm of the interiors of European houses. It would seem, why such an impressive home for two liberated persons, and this just gives the necessary space for deftly creating an unforgettable atmosphere by clearly placing objects against the background of the main actresses. The mosaic folds, the cube assembles.
You have to look at this thing. And also listen. Butterflies are not what they seem. You don't feel like Harry Houdini in a locked chest. Sexual games will not always cause a languid desire. Someone's bound to get jealous. Flashed love will bring to tears, while happiness will be when the dominatrix finds his tender panties unwashed. At the beginning of all insanity is always beautiful, the euphoria goes off the scale, you want more and more, but only one of it. But suddenly the clothes became too simple, there is nothing to say for the strong excitement of the partner. . .
Getting heavenly pleasure from sex is, of course, wildly enjoyable. It's such a sweet drug that it's hard to break away. But is it easy to put feelings somewhere, so as not to suddenly show weakness? Dane Sidse Babette Knudsen and, most likely, Italian Chiara D' Anna flawlessly showed a complete set of passion, attraction, pleasure and possession. 45-year-old at that time Frau Knudsen in underwear is not just the embodiment of violent teenage fantasies, including this lively work of art, while sophisticated and serene serenity Señor D' Anna magnetically pulls because of eyes and submission.
And I had a dream. And in dreams, butterflies flew. A lot of butterflies. Not if they're here for me. In the arms of the beloved, the one. . .
Very melodic and even attractive film. Beautiful scenery. Entomology. Absence of men and cars. And these two...
Their relationships in modern society are hardly shocking, as are the practices they resort to during sex. The main thing is different: behind the outer veil of lesbian sex and BDSM, it is not what appears at the beginning of the film: a strict old lady and an unhappy lower one, who does not seem to serve, always gets punished. The further the narrative goes and the further the relationships of the heroines develop, the more it becomes clear that the lower one is just happy.
She gets everything she wants and realizes her fantasies, achieving her through resentment and whims. There is no “lower rebellion” because of injustice, but a “upper revolt” that ends in tears and apologies. The upper one is old, and understands this, so she holds on to her young love by following her lead. The lower one is selfish and does not want to “suffer” not according to its own scenario, even if these “sufferings” are ordinary care for the person who loves it.
Such relationships can be translated into many unequal couples, where one loves and the other allows himself to love on his own terms.
In the work of the British Peter Strickland, who directed “The Duke of Burgundy”, traced all the components of the author’s film – a special look, special directing and his own original script. With few works, Strickland can be proud that his Catalin Varga was one of the discoveries of the Berlin Film Festival a few years ago. “The Duke of Burgundy” presents us the director’s view of a world without men, living, nevertheless, according to male laws. Hermeticity and smooth mechanistic tape fascinate as a beautiful kaleidoscope with magical images. The Duke of Burgundy is set as a psychological drama about the love of two women trying to lay their love on a bed of sado-masochistic practices.
The utopia of the screen world of The Duke of Burgundy is a utopia of the sophistication of relationships. In the role of Cynthia, the lady in the on-screen relationship, the dominatrix, Strickland shot the in-demand Sidse Babett Knudsen, which is familiar to us from the recent “Hologram for the King” Tykver. Cynthia studies butterflies of a certain species - the "Duke of Burgundy" - and is engaged in highly scientific activities. Chiaru D'Anna, who played Evelyn, Cynthia's submissive, Strickland shoots for the second time and not without success. Evelyn assists Cynthia in the study of butterflies and creatively directs their relationship into the channel of enlightened sado-maso. There is a twist in the relationship between Evelyn and Cynthia, clarifying the obvious: in a relationship, the main one is not always the one who seems so when looked at.
To give Strickland credit, The Duke of Burgundy is far from a banal film featuring lesbian love. The mechanics of everyday life trample love passion and sublimate it into rituals of daily delays, cleaning shoes, washing panties. Questions of dominance and subordination, presented in the feminist aspect, show all the convention of roles in relationships. Even after playing, you can always stop and say a password that stops the game. Martyr - the suffering is over. And to return to the real world, where for some reason it is considered abnormal to speak openly about your love.
"The Duke of Burgundy" drowns in sincerity, which spills leisurely in every shot. This slowness is akin to an affectionate killer. Semi-blurring, multilayered frames, the accuracy of the story and fascinating cyclicality. Strickland manages to saturate history with poetics, to show how once attractive Cynthia constantly talks without words with a merciless mirror. Cynthia’s Dominatrix Tears is a strange metamorphosis of humanism, revealing the gender convention of the “Duke of Burgundy” world.
The tape is replete with sarcastic-comedic elements whether it is a few female dummies on the scientific report of women, who else, passionate researchers of the peculiarities of life of butterflies, cute snoring Cynthia after love pleasures, an unusual solution to the gift of submissive Evelyn. We can blame Strickland for the fact that his female world quite successfully functions according to male patterns, copying all clichés and stereotypes. This is the problem of the very idea of the film, which instead of a powerful anthem to feminism, turns into a relatively banal melodrama about how sexual rituals challenge natural desires. As a result, the picture begins to slide into a beautifully directed and visually alluring kitsch about two not very young mistresses. Strickland is not entirely convincing behind all the beauty, but he manages to show that playing for true love is one of the ways to preserve it.
“The Duke of Burgundy” is a British-Hungarian film, filmed by a director widely known in narrow circles, a regular of European film festivals Peter Strickland. This is not a film about French aristocrats. This is a magical and surreal action about lesbians and BDSM.
Do you know what BDSM is? In this film you clearly and very colorfully demonstrate everything. But don’t worry – there are no sky-high perversions, and especially clichéd sadomaso-porn there.
Just in some illusory “land of women” two learned ladies portray a maid and a mistress. A little humiliation, a little fake flagellation, a little gentle bondage, a little bit of foot fetishism, a little hypothetical golden rain - the ladies are just doing role-playing. What is our life? Game!
But it's not that simple. After watching the movie, there are questions, questions...
What is betrayal and what is jealousy?
Where are the boundaries of love and the limits of what is allowed? .
When does fantasy end and when does reality begin?
How to break out of this cycle and get back into it? .
Who, after all, is the hostess and who is the victim?
“The Duke of Burgundy” is a film like a fairy tale: butterflies, ghosts, soap bubbles. “The Duke of Burgundy” is a film similar to the past: a sore back, dirty laundry, banal treason. What will win - romantic idyll or rheumatic life?
The audience will never know.
“The Duke of Burgundy” is a very beautiful and very high-quality film work. Do not pay attention to erotic scenery, look and have aesthetic pleasure.
9 out of 10
An incredibly elegant film was directed by a young British director Peter Strickland. Of course, first of all, the viewer will get a great aesthetic pleasure from filming nature: from the first frames, the film envelopes the autumn charm of colors, and against this background, strange relations between the two women will slowly develop.
Actually, in fact, this is a play with two heroines: the rest of the characters are few and they appear very briefly, or even serve only as a scenery. Therefore, only by the middle of the film you understand that the strange world of Strickland is inhabited exclusively by women, and this understanding seems to give a new impetus to the story of mistresses: and so the fragile line between sleep and reality, games and fantasies finally dissolves, leaving the viewer himself to determine the reality of what is happening.
The place and time of the action are also very conditional: maybe it is just Burgundy, put in the title of the film? Not a modern region in France, no, but another, real, which ceased to exist at the end of the fifteenth century? After all, you will agree that the film blows something medieval: these cobbled streets, houses, some furniture, clothes - all this creates an elusive atmosphere of the autumn of the Middle Ages, I do not know how consciously the director outlined these parallels with Heising.
All this ultimately makes the film hermetic, a kind of “thing in itself”, akin to an entomological collection or a clogged bottle of wine, and it just needs to be savored and viewed through a magnifying glass, enjoying the smallest touches and shades, and this is beautiful.
8 out of 10
Films like drugs have always been loved by me personally, and certainly not for their script, or, competent plot. And in general, I value cinema last of all for the quality of performance, I appreciate it for its witchcraft, the ability to give you soothing, or purification from what you saw on the screen. You can interpret their meaning in different ways, but here it is completely different! To judge, it is more reasonable to take out something useful for oneself from such drugs, of course, it is possible, only in the case of the Duke of Burgundy it is not so necessary, and it is not necessary to arrange discussions about its significance for all mankind. For such a "Duke of Burgundy" is too small, if judged extremely cynically - a simple melodrama, only more inventive, more sophisticated, and very attractive, like the underwear of the main characters.
In my humble opinion, its value lies precisely in the beauty of performance, melody, in the content itself, style, magic. That is, what is characteristic, for each viewer, there is a little bit of everything in it, for those who like complex author's films - there is a theme of love relations, presented in the original vein, for those who love beauty - types of interiors, pleasant design, clear camera work. In its beauty, this movie is certainly not inferior, and in some aspects even looks better, other films about the lesbian theme.
If it’s serious in some ways, it even looks stronger than Todd Haynes’ Carol, I personally have much more emotions and looks less fake, in some ways even fresher, and for this freshness I appreciate the movie much more. Needless to say, this is taste, and for those who like the hottest they will have to taste the "Life of Adele", for those who adhere to the classical view - "Carol". And for those who prefer a mixture of both, "The Duke of Burgundy" will be a mixture of both, aged on balance, not stupid, and oddly much more natural.
Taking into account the small monotony, a certain languid mood of the film, I will not cunning this movie for midnightrs and melancholics, and is unlikely to fit for a cheerful viewing, and suddenly it is not worth pouncing on. However, I can say with confidence that the film will be able to give pleasure, a certain sense of temptation, but when watching it, he seems to flirt with you, communicates. If you compare with the "Life of Adele" there are not so many emotions, there is more palpable slight intoxication. Here it is much more appropriate to compare with the cult “With eyes wide closed”, with “Love mood”, that is, the emphasis here is strictly placed on the problem of partner relationships and some mystical element. The naked symbolism is the basis of the whole concept of the film, complementing everything else, not only pleases the eye, but also the mind.
And by the end you are as stunned, as if not expecting to see something high from the melodrama, you acquire something amazing and appetizing. Director Peter Strickland, like the masters of surrealism (Lynch, Buñuel) mixes together in his vessel different styles, and there is a bit of Bertolluch (eroticism, after all), so everything is beautiful that you feel satisfaction from him. You enjoy the film like a wine of an elite brand, and no matter how lofty it sounds, its soul is felt with every minute of watching, and, in my opinion, this is enough to call it, in my humble opinion, a real art!
Butterflies are special creatures. The souls of ugly caterpillars, these fragile beauties do not live long and delight the hearts of poetic natures with unimaginable colors, trepidation. Filmmakers rarely turn to butterflies, and those who use these insects for plot shades see them as monsters. Exquisite, charming, but monsters. The "Dead Head" dolls put in the throats of his Buffalo victims Bill from "The Silence of the Lambs." The butterflies that plastered Rust Kol in True Detective. Their trembling aura is not used to frame the surroundings, it is cruel metaphors, psychopomps.
Peter Strickland uses butterflies in his film to show through patterns, otherworldly sounds and beauty the multifaceted nature of women who play vicious games. In recent years, many pictures have been shot in which the sweetness of vice covers the meanings. “Stranger by the lake” to another viewer can cause psychological trauma with his candor. The vitality of the heroine "Life of Adele" shimmers through the screen into the space of the beholder. “Vicious Games” (Stoker) with Mia Wasikowska in the title role oozes with the ringing of madness in the temples. Here is the “Duke of Burgundy”, suffocated beyond measure with pollen and the aroma of passion, similar to a dessert made of lipstick and butterflies, seductive and exciting, melting poison in the core.
Despite the fact that the above paintings are in the same line with the “Duke of Burgundy”, the origins of the picture takes place in the depth of classical paintings, where vice is mixed with the juices of despair: “Mademoiselle” by Tony Richardson, “The Secret Ceremony” by Joseph Lowsey and “Hunger” by Tony Scott. Two of the authors are English, as is Strickland. British filmmakers have always had the courage to experiment with celluloid worlds: perhaps their natural restraint stirs up the passion that explodes on screen. But only for those who can see.
The story in this case is a thin line, the roles are played by accessories strung on the story. This picture is a deception inside a deception, the details are meant to distract, like the rustle of a butterfly’s wings in the dark. In the meantime, you're walking into the abyss. I didn't just mention the word "vice." This does not apply to gays or lesbians. Sex is the sacrament of two, no matter what gender they are. But in the case of two women or men, a mystery is carefully concealed; a secret that excites no less than intimacy itself. The depravity of the picture is that the viewer is watching. And falling into a trap woven from soap foam, stockings, wigs, perspirations, whispers and games of submission, misses the important.
Here I want to return to the first list, which featured modern tapes. Shocking, seducing, flirting with the viewer, these films encrypt their contents, looping and confusing, hiding the truth. They talk not about sex, not about passion, not about caresses and eroticism. They're about pain, loneliness, fear, doubt. They're about the things that we, living in a semi-virtual world, hide in dark closets so that we never bother or think about it. But like butterflies in the dark, these emotions live, move, mutate, grow and destroy us. Under the lacquered surface of the sexual life of two women, as in a black box decorated with intricate carvings, lies a bloody heart, full of horror at the fact that he was abandoned.
9 out of 10
Restrained, but at the same time very sensitive film about BDSM. The monotony of the repeated scenes is initially surprising, but there is a hidden development behind them. And the same roles played at the beginning of the film and at the end are perceived differently.
Excellent performance of the actresses, given the static nature of the film. More mature Cynthia appears before the viewer in the role of the dominant in the female couple. Young Evelyn as a submissive.
But is this true in the real world of feelings? Especially for the viewer, the door of the dressing room is opened and you can peek, see how Cynthia is not just given her role. She really loves her partner in sexual games, tenderly, painfully, tired. She is haunted by the fear of losing the younger, healthier, sensual and fantasy Evelyn. By the end of the film, you realize that Cynthia is the hostage of the relationship, it is she who does not crave and does not invent, but obeys the rules of the BDSM game to keep her love close. Who is the dominant and who is the submissive?
For six months now, the Duke of Burgundy has been publicly available, which has every reason to become a cult film like When the Night Falls or The Life of Adele. But this British tape will fool you at least twice. Of any duke, especially Burgundy, we are not talking here, unless, of course, we take into account that this is how entomologists call “forest parsley” – a daytime butterfly occupying the roadsides. Moreover, there is no male character in this picture! The Duke of Burgundy is an aesthetic feminist melodrama about two middle-aged ladies, Cynthia and Evelyn, who have turned their relationship into role-playing games with an obvious sadomasochistic bias.
To be honest, up to a point I seriously and naively believed that the painting would explore the nature of sado-masochism. However, by the middle of the film, these hopes finally melted away, reducing my audience pleasure only to the opportunity to watch fabulously beautiful pictures - with graceful curts to Philip Haas and Peter Greenway, horror films and iconic lesbian opuses. In general, there is something to look at if your mind still considers itself unfairly deprived. “The Duke of Burgundy” is, in essence, an anthem of feminine love, against the background of which the already mentioned cult works of Patricia Rosem, Abdelatif Kesheesh and others can fade. This picture seems to sign the death sentence to the traditional kind of love, closed on the relationship between men and women.
A world free of men looks not only less flawed, but even more harmonious, for violence is confined to a game that is life-diverse and of purely therapeutic value. Despite the sado-maso bias, so much almost obscene tenderness is poured out on the screen that masculine heroes, and even just hetero-cinema, do not have any chance for a bright future. Depriving (in the absence of men) of attitude (and life) of frenzy and brutality, the film offers for consideration an almost utopian idyll, the purity of which is possible only on the screen. This movie is incredible, unbelievably beautiful. And the cameraman Nicholas D. Knowland with no less, if not more reason than the composers-partners Faris Badwan and Rachel Zeffera, could qualify for the main European film award, which eventually awarded it to the authors of music.
The director himself seemed to revel in everything that fell into the camera’s field of vision: the wonderful autumn landscapes of deciduous forests, lace linen and even soap bubbles in a bath with soaked women’s panties. What can we say about butterflies and moths, which the main character studies in order to read about them from time to time in the local lecture hall, where secular ladies with the same excited looks of wild roe deer gather. And it must be admitted that this gathering of ladies entomologists is much more like a club of latent lesbians. Thick lace mannerism with stroking hips and feet, with sitting on the face of the partner, with crotch licking and (my goodness, sorry) urophilia and urolagnia would look, probably, pure exploitation of lesbian erotica disguised as an intellectual movie, if the second and really took place.
But Peter Strickland, it seems, is first of all a sinophile, and then a director, because the main thing for him is not a message (message), but an irresistible desire to present his discretion. That is why all figurative solutions are frozen with beautiful pictures, not especially working on an idea that does not clearly manifest itself until the very end. And the “too subtle” play of his mind turns into almost an anecdote: as tempting as it may be to compare people with insects, this parallel looks secondary and too far-fetched. Moreover, a little more and from the picture would begin to smell that frightening lesbian folly, which usually happens to some of the works of those Wuman directors who somewhere inside something overlaps on the basis of same-sex love, and who in the end even the most innocent feelings manage to turn into jelly uncontrollable sentiments.
The Duke of Burgundy, although it does not reach the depths of intellectual drive, offers a solution to the often encountered problem of lesbian couples, when too long and non-conflict joint pastime exhausts the relationship partners, thereby leading them to a break. Changing wigs and corsets, waving eyelashes or a foot thrown on the thigh, Cynthia imperiously gives orders to Evelyn, who will not defy and obediently carry them out. And at night, they both sleep tete-a-tete under the same blanket, enclosing each other in close arms. Perhaps due to the fact that the heroines twice a day change the scenario of relations, in the evenings playing maid and mistress, and in bed becoming themselves, their relationship, despite the seemingly emerging crisis, not only does not end, but, judging by the finale, is gaining new strength and sharpness.
From poetically minded directors of the XXI century you expect hymns to the glory of pure aesthetics, bold pictorial solutions and a magical enveloping atmosphere. Traveling through the backstreets of festival cinema is most often associated with light intoxication from stylistic delights, but together with Strickland you will powder your nose with a cinematic analogue of cocaine.
The opening stage and impeccable credits prepare us for the first aesthetic delights. An almost pastoral idyll with the singing of birds, the murmur of water and a bicycle walk of a young girl to cozy voiceover music breaks off at the door of a rich house. The serenity of the narrative gives way to growing tension, slowly and viscously spilling through space. Upon reaching her destination, Evilin leaves her bike sideways and walks cautiously toward the door, where an inhospitable lady in her 40s greets her with a cold reproach: "You're late." Walking into the room, lowering her eyes, and humbly sitting on the edge of the sofa, the girl again makes a mistake. The shrill look and disapprovingly calm tone of the hostess seem to finally knock her off her rut: “Did I let you sit?” Eviline will not only have to clean the room and wash all panties by hand, but also give the imperious Cynthia a foot massage. The rapidly progressive level of tyranny will be rationally explained in a matter of minutes. All this is part of the role-playing games, dropping as the story progresses to new details, the mention of which is hardly appropriate in light of the upcoming plot twists of the drama. It remains only to note that Strickland’s painting features only women and, it seems, in this fantastic world there is nothing but a lesbian BDSM and a pseudoscientific club dedicated to butterflies, more like an ancient secret cult.
The deceptive originality of the script in fact is perhaps the weakest point of The Duke of Burgundy. Yes, the British managed to create an extravagant world, giving it a catchy concept, but the plot did not go very far from Fifty Shades of Grey. Of course, the dynamics of the relationship between Cynthia and Evilin is not so obvious in the first scenes, which allows the actresses to realize their skills, and the audience to rethink the position of the heroines, but the true power of the film is located in a slightly different plane. In the era of fashionable minimalism, Strickland's work is absorbed with some painful greed. The director is obsessed with form, it is here that you will see the best picture and hear the best sound among the new products of 2014. The author did not set himself the task of fitting full elegance-causing frames into the context of history, he works from the opposite: here the visual is the basis for illustrating predictable difficulties in relationships in which perversions overshadow love. Multi-layered images involving mirrors and windows, close-ups of insects, even banal wildlife are shot with amazingly sophisticated ingenuity. Beauty, impossible on this side of the screen, is in everything from the soap foam on your underwear to the worms rotting in the ground. When the ghost of everyday life slowly floats into the cinema, the viewer witnesses a striking contrast: fantasy sexual aesthetics is not ready to enter into an alliance with ordinary humanity and fatigue. The perfect world of butterflies and sexuality is invaded by such alien things as back pain and a battered nightgown. Aren’t these the first signs of a possible upheaval that could lead to a normal (and somewhat mundane) relationship? Can sensitivity to a partner eliminate inequality and an unrestrained desire to satisfy one’s own desires? People who practice sadomasochism have a rule: when the game loses the perfect balance between humiliation, pain, excitement and pleasure, then the key word one of the partners can stop. Ah, if only we could all just say "Brazhnik" to end our suffering.
If only we could all end our sufferings by simply saying Pinastri.
When you like the film, be prepared that you can not recommend it to your friends.
This is an absolute masterpiece, which deceptively in the first 5 minutes seems to be another little thing about a couple with oddities. But the further we go, the more we plunge into the surreal world of butterflies, women and suffering.
Entourage, scenes, dialogues, buildings, poses - nothing can leave indifferent in this film. Something delights, something interests, something disgusts. At the same time, there is not a single frank or hidden explanation sewn by the director in case of a “near viewer”. I don't get it. It's your problem. Such films always give space for the flight of fantasy, giving rise to their own explanations and theories.
Perfectly selected actresses are another plus. You believe everyone, no matter whose role is in tune with your oddities.
Separately, I want to note that the film is clearly one of those that should be reviewed. First, in order to again plunge into the atmosphere of the “Duke of Burgundy”, and secondly to make sure that he did not miss the details, nuances and what was behind the scenes.
The conclusion is that the film is a masterpiece, you must watch.