I borrowed Dangerous Liaisons on VHS from the library today as well, since it was not at my video store. While I was at it, I borrowed several other classics as well, heh.

I'll try to watch DL on Wednesday.

It's one of the most deserving BP nominees of the 80's and my personal winner from that lot of BP nominees that year. Like an onion (and like Shrek ), it has multiple layers and it works either as a social commentary of that period or as a tragic love story. Michelle Pffeifer, Glenn Close and John Malkovich are all brilliant (when do these three win an Oscar?). Keanu Reeves doesn't suck in a non-action movie and Uma Thurman shows early potential. The last scene is unforgettable. I honestly can't believe how anyone can prefer the remake with Sarah Michelle Gellar and Reese Witherspoon, even though that one has its share of (guilty) pleasures... I haven't seen Valmont yet (or I don't remeber seeing it), so I won't make any comments about that one.


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Oscar background for Dangerous Liaisons:

Lost Best Picture to Rain Man
NOT even nominated for Director
Glenn Close lost Best Actress of Jodie Foster in The Accused
Michelle Pfeiffer lost Best Supporting Actress to Geena Davis in The Accidental Tourist
Won Adapted Screenplay
Won Art Direction
Won Costume Design
Lost Original Score to The Milagro Beanfield War ( )

Interesting year as well: like the most recent Oscars, only 2 movies nominated for Best Picture got in for Film Editing (Who Framed Roger Rabbit? won) and only 3 songs were nominated for Original Song. A non-Best Pic nominated film dominated the Tech categories as well (Who Framed Roger Rabbit?)

Frankly...Who Framed Roger Rabbit? should have been nominated for Best Picture anyway!

YES!!!

Six nominations/Four wins for a movie like this is impressive.

Will watch DL soon.

Dangerous Liasions didn't get a single Golden Globes nod. I assume that's because it's somehow ineligible? I was checking IMDb for what other awards the film won or nominated besides Oscar, and I was surprised to see besides BAFTA and a bunch of foreign film awards from non-English countries, WGA is basically the only domestically one it won.

I watched it yesterday, and I have to say that I remember it being better than it was. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't fantastic. Michelle Pfeiffer deserved to win the damn Oscar though...Davis was good, but come on...Pfeiffer was great. I'll elaborate a lot more tomorrow, but I think I'll give it a B.

i Just got it from blockbuster,$2.99 for 5 nights.I will watch it later tonight or Tomorrow.

http://www.worldofkj.com/articles/Other/Top10I.php

Good article, but I have just seen half of the list or so, heh. Makes me all the more excited about Dangerous Liaisons. A Few Good Men should definitely be up there, it'd probably be the top pick of that year for me as well. The Piano, however, I consider very overrated.

Well, I love Ibsen's plays, and the novel The Awakening (Kate Chopin), and I really feel The Piano was like those books. I will talk about it more, later, when you guys actually view it. I don't want to detract from the current coverage.

Speaking of which, for anyone that has read Ibsen, I always thought Hedda and Isabelle were very similar characters. I also find it interesting that the British version was named after Valmont, as I always thought Liaisons being primarily about the Marquise.

I've only read six of Ibsen's plays (Hedda Gabler, The Master Builder, An Enemy of the People [saw the PBS presentation also haha], A Doll's House, Ghosts, and The Wild Duck) so I'll make sure to check out Hedda Gabler again after watching DL.

Great article, Dolce. I still have yet to see Kiss of the Spider Woman, even though the book was great.

I agree entirely with your comments about the character of Marquise Isabelle de Merteuil. She was wicked, conniving, and indeed manipulative. The ending scene was brilliant, which was mostly due to the brilliant acting from Close. You could feel the pain and embarrassment she must have been going through. The movie did drag in parts, I will admit, but that closing scene brought everything together.

I actually found this today after scouring my local video store. I can't believe I've never seen this. I'll watch it in the next couple of days.

It's in the queue. It should be sent out by tomorrow, hopefully.

Love Spider Woman. And since you liked the book (thanks for being the only one who read it that month during the book club), I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by its adaptation to the screen.



Not to bring up the "teenage" remake, but the one thing I couldn't relate to in Cruel Intentions was the social confines of women. Gellar's Kathryn was wealthy, true, but in the modern era her dabblings came off as vicious, rather than desperate, because she had much more flexibility as a woman than Isabelle would have had in her day. Because of that, the former's actions seem to just b selfish, while I always found Isabelle (and Close was divine in this role) slowly suffocating while still really trying to gasp for air. Not one minute of Dangerous Liaisons didn't have me rivetted.

I expect (and lt me know if its true or not) that people that already saw Cruel Intentions first would find parts slower, because they knew what would happen to Cecil and Raphael, and also to Sebastien and Marie. Th first time I saw it, however, I had no idea, and every turn was new.

Close's failure to win that year still hurts. :-(

You're a big Glenn Close fan, right? She's fantastic in this.

The year before, Glenn Close was nominated for Fatal Attraction, which was a different kind of crazy than her role in DL. I'm still baffled how she lost to such a weak Jodie performance. I guess since Jodie in The Accused was the quintessential role of the wronged damsel (baity!), while Close's Isabelle is the stronger, dominant, manipulative one (which almost always loses - see Sigourney Weaver). A couple of years later, Kathy Bates becomes one of the few exceptions when she won for Misery.

Damn, I was just about to watch it when realizing the disk is completely damaged. Now I have to wait for the replacement. Will switch to Netflix after this month.

It came in from Netflix this afternoon.
I'll try to watch it tomorrow night.

I've never seen Cruel Intentions, so I guess that doesn't really apply to me. It wasn't like it was extremely dragged out, just a tad slow in parts. However, I don't remember it being like that the first time I saw it, so the repeat viewing may have had something to do with it.

Netflix is probably wondering, why the sudden mini-burst for DL rentals?

Nah, not really a big Close fan though I think she's a good actress. I am a huge fan of another actress in this movie. She's perhaps my all-time favorite, and no, it's not Uma Thurman. Or Swoosie Kurtz, but rather Michelle Pfeiffer. She deserved an Oscar nomination for this, if for no other reason than to act like John Malkovich was actually attractive.

Which brings me to my major complaint about this. How can two people as unattractive as Malkovich and Glenn Close be so irresistable? I know looks weren't everything and much of their game revolved control, manipulation, and deception, but some physical attraction should be included. I've never seen Valmont, the other screen version of this, but wasn't Annette Bening cast in the Glenn Close role? I think that's much better casting. And my minor quibble isn't to take away from the performances which I thought were excellent. But Jodi Foster is far better in The Accused IMHO than Close is in this. Foster may be a victim, it's true, but she's certainly not a likeable one.

I did like this though, esp. that great opening sequence and the last 5 or 10 minutes. I would grade it in the B+/A- range.

One question: Did anyone else think the Uma Thurman character was going to be revealed to be Malkovich's daughter?! When he was telling her about his relationship with her mother, I thought that would be shockingly revealed later. Maybe the audience was meant to infer that. That would have been truly twisted.

Man, it still hasn't come yet in the mail!!!

I'm kind of upset.

If you guys move on to the second pic, can we keep this thread open for continuing discussion for a week or two longer? Thanks.

I just finished watching it...

It's an excellent film. I thought the final scene was brilliant. I haven't seen much of Glenn Close's work so I was really impressed. Same with Michelle Pfeiffer.

Sorta makes me want to watch Cruel Intentions sometime in the near future.