BITTER MOON, 1992
Movie Review

Roman Polanski had delivered some years back the thriller “Frantic”, a slow thriller starred by Harrison Ford and Model Emmanellle Seigner, when he did Bitter Moon, a film based on the novel “Lunes de Fiel” written by Pascal Bruckner and delightfully photographed by DP A.I.C. Tonino Delli Colli. It was the first real hit Polanski had after he had his taste of a film flop with his epic period piece “Pirates” (which was a financial and critical failure), and even though his last film was pretty good, it didn’t had the success everyone expected. So, as this film got to the cinemas in the year 1992, this erotic piece came as a new hit in the director’s growing list of wonderful films and also brought him back to work with his love (he had married Emmanuelle in 1989 and has had two kids with her: Morgane and Elvis).

The film is a tragic erotic piece that features a fresh Hugh Grant, a beautiful Emmanuelle, an interesting Kristin Scott Thomas and a fabulous Peter Coyote. If the cast is not enough, the film features one of the most beautiful cities in the world (Paris, France) and a couple of sequences that you might never forget once you’ve seen them (one of Roman’s films’ special abilities).

REVIEW:

The sea (as seen in the Sage thesaurus):
2 Turbulent water with swells of considerable size.
3 Anything apparently limitless in quantity or volume.

Just as life it self.

As this film begins, we are presented various images of the sea, it is seen through a window, a cruise window. Life is vast as the sea, so is what lies underneath the surface, the imagery has just begun and it is already appealing, we are then introduced to Fiona and Nigel, a couple of British weds who are cruising towards India (as shown brilliantly inside the scene), played by Kristin Scott Thomas and Hugh Grant. By accident, they happen to aid a girl who’s sick inside the restroom. Later that night, Nigel finds the girl at the bar; tries to talk to her, but she, the perfect femme fatalei (Seigner), is not amused by him. As Nigel walks back to his wife, he is approached by Oscar (Peter Coyote), a man in a wheelchair, who happens to need a hand to get to the hallway that leads to the cabins. Instead of being a helpless man, Oscar turns out to be the girl’s husband, a hard tongued man, he invites Nigel in for a drink and since Fiona is already sleeping, Nigel accepts. As they get to know each other for a while, Oscar tells him about Mimi. We are then introduced to her in a beautiful flashback featuring a sublime We are given a glimpse of heaven: Mimi sitting at the back of a bus; Oscar is watching her as he reads through the newspaper. A man comes asking for everyone’s tickets and Oscar is suddenly aware that Mimi doesn’t have one and gives his to her. The whole sequence is a worthy beginning to a powerful love story, she is beautiful, so is this scene: the busman drops Oscar off at Rue D’Assas (Paris, France) and it works as the strong introduction to what we are to be told in the 100 + minutes to come.

Oscar used to be a writer who grew stacks of documents he couldn’t get to publish, and he had fallen madly for the girl: he looked for her at the bus stops until the drivers recognized him. Until one day, he found her working at a restaurant and learnt her name.

Lavishly, the love story unfolds for us in a series of flashbacks that blend with episodes of the present.

But, this isn’t quite Polanski’s usual style, is it?

If you have been missing the usual Polanski’s treatment (not that I noted an absence of it), you are about to smile, as the plot goes further, we find out that Oscar lived such a rich sex life with Mimi that grew until they had no more lust between them.

Wave after wave, the two stories unfold: Nigel and Fiona’s relationship is about to go through a test and Oscar’s tale keeps going sour.

Oscar nears bankruptcy and his relationship with Mimi dries out. It dries out in a farm, with a pig crawling in the bedroom.Soon, Mimi is flirting with Nigel and Oscar’s story gets darker as we are told the things that got him into the wheelchair and indeed its better to watch it than to read about it here.There is a wonderful counterpoint between Oscar and Nigel’s respective stories, Oscar is a stronger character and definitely steals the whole film as he keeps on playing with Nigel’s desire to be with Mimi.

After he plays a joke on Nigel he tells him “Have a heart. Don’t be too rough on a man demolished by a love that was too strong”. He was conscious that they might have stopped for good at a moment, but they didn’t, they kept on going and going. And so does Nigel, he just can’t help himself from listening and then wanting Oscar’s “life”, they grow so far apart from each other that it is that precise fact that drives Grant’s character.The real story is starting to unfold about now, we are to see the decline of the writer’s love and life. As we approach the film’s resolution, everything starts falling off its place. Past and present catch up as Oscar’s story comes to a tragic end, the love story is gone, Polanski navigates the cruise, hold on to your seats as you might experience turbulent waters. The turbulent waters of life itself.

The films flashback transitions just couldn’t get better, there are ones that come to mind because of how they are done (those in John Sayles Lonestar), but the ones shot by Tonino for this film are amazing, subtle and instead of distracting they are actually so well crafted that they add to the film’s overall look.

It could be also polite to talk about the remarkable work with the lenses in this film, is not quite easy to shoot in tight places without having a distorted image, it might have been Mr. Colli, but it has been said that Roman’s knowledge of the lenses is greater than most DP’s, and it might have been a skill perfected while studying in Poland.

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