Movies - Baise-moi

Home > Listing Index > Movies > Baise-moi

	Movies - Baise-moi

Baise-moi is a book first published in 1999 and authored by Virginie Despentes. A film based on the book, and with the same name, was released the following year. The film, directed by Despentes and actress Coralie Trinh Thi, received intense media coverage because its graphic mix of real rather than simulated sex and violence was on the limit of that allowed by censors in various countries around the world.

Plot

Baise-moi (literally translated as "Fuck Me," though "Rape Me" better typifies the intended meaning) tells the story of Nadine (played by Karen Lancaume) and Manu (Raffaëla Anderson) who go on a violent spree against a society in which they feel marginalized.

Nadine is a part-time prostitute and porn actress. Manu is a slacker who does anything to get by in the small town in southern France where they they both live. One day, Manu and her only friend, a drug addict, are brutally gang-raped by a trio of degenerate street punks. While her friend struggles and screams in terror, Manu lies still with a detached look, angering the rapists. Full of rage, Manu returns home and tells her boyfriend of her ordeal. The boyfriend reacts by vowing to find and take revenge upon the rapists. But Manu kills him instead. Meanwhile, after another outing, Nadine comes home and after an argument with her roommate, Nadine kills her and takes off with their rent money. Nadine suffers another emotional setback when her only real friend, whom is also her pimp, is shot and killed before her by some of his business 'associates.'

Later that night, Manu and Nadine both attempt to take the last train from an otherwise deserted station. They miss the train, but begin talking to one another. They realise they share common feelings of anger and together begin go on a violent road trip characterized by the pattern of meeting a man, having sex with him and then killing him. In need of money, they also hold up a convenience store and kill a woman at an ATM. Critics have pointed to these scenes to suggest the film is not a purely feminist endeavour.

Finally, after much killing and aimless driving, the two women enter a swinger's bar and kill many of the couples there. The pair discuss what they have done, and agree that it has all been pointless because nothing has changed inside them.

It all ends when Manu is shot in the neck and dies while attempting to rob another convenience store. Nadine flees to a remote cabin to commit suicide, but gets arrested by the police before she can do so.

Making the film

The movie was filmed on location between October and December 1999 in Biarritz, Bordeaux, Lyon and Marseille. It was shot on digital video without artificial lighting. This low budget method of filming divided critics - some said it gave the film an amateurish look. Lou Lumenick, reviewing the film in the New York Post, went further and said it "looked like hell". Others, such as James Travers writing for , said the filming method added something to the film. Travers wrote "the film's 'rough and ready' feel helps to strengthen its artistic vision and draws out the messages which it is trying to get across, without distracting its audience with overly choreographed 'shock scenes'."

Release

The movie was co-directed by an actress (Coralie Trinh Thi) whose previous work was in unambigiously pornographic movies and the two lead roles were also played by former porn actresses. Perhaps in part due to this, the movie was criticised as thinly veiled pornography by many members of the media. Le Monde, for instance, called it a "sick film". Time magazine bucked the trend by saying "Virginie Despentes and Coralie Trinh Thi's festival sensation is stark, serious and original. And as one of the amoral avengers, Raffaela Anderson has true star quality - part seraph, all slut." The co-directors rejected the pornography charge - Trinh Thi said in an interview with the Sunday Times that "This movie is not for masturbation, is not porn." Despentes concurred, saying their film "was not erotic."

In its home country, France, the movie was initially released with a 16 rating, given by a ministerial commission. The rating caused outrage, particularly amongst members of the right-wing Promouvoir religious group. Some groups litigated against the classification decision, arguing that the film should be X-rated given its high content of realistic sex and extreme violence, both of which are grounds for X classification in France; the Conseil d'Etat ruled its classification illegal, removing it from the theater circuit. As the film was the first to be banned in France for 28 years, the film became something of a cause celebre – with one anti-censorship campaigner calling the ban "totalitarian state censorship". The Conseil later re-classified the film with an X certificate, a category usually reserved for mainstream pornographic movies. The French minister for culture, Catherine Tasca, pacified the debate by re-introducing an 18 certificate. The film was then re-released with this newly restored certificate.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Baise-moi ]

This page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article Baise-moi; it is used under the GNU Free Documentation License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the GFDL.

Searches on eBay