Belle de Jour – The Criterion Collection (Blu-ray)

Theatrical Release Date: France/Italy, 1967
Director: Luis Buñuel
Writers: Luis Buñuel, Jean-Claude Carrière
Cast: Catherine Deneuve, Jean Sorel, Michel Piccoli, Geneviève Page, Pierre Clémenti, Françoise Fabian, Macha Méril

Release Date: January 17th, 2012
Approximate Running Time: 100 Minutes 14 seconds
Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1 Widescreen / 1080 Progressive / MPEG-4 AVCC
Rating: NR
Sound: LPCM Mono French
Subtitles: English
Region Coding: Region A
Retail Price: $39.95

"Séverine, a Paris housewife who begins secretly spending her after­noon hours working in a bordello. This surreal and erotic late-sixties daydream from provocateur for the ages Luis Buñuel is an examination of desire and fetishistic pleasure (its characters’ and its viewers’), as well as a gently absurdist take on contemporary social mores and class divisions." - synopsis provided by the distributor

Video: 5/5

Here’s the information provided about this release's transfer, "This new high-definition digital transfer was created on a Spirit 2K Datacine from a 35mm interpositive. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris, scratches, splices, warps, jitter, and flicker were manually removed using MTI's DRS, while Image Systems' DVNR was used for small dirt, grain, and noise reduction."

Belle de Jour comes on a 50 GB dual layer Blu-ray.

Disc Size: 38.7 GB

Feature: 27.5 GB

The source looks excellent; flesh tones look healthy, colors look correct, image clarity and black levels are solid, there are no issues with compression, and grain remains intact.

Audio: 5/5

This release comes with one audio option, a LPCM mono mix in French with removable English subtitles. The audio is in excellent shape; dialogue always comes through clearly, everything sounds balanced, and ambient sounds are well-represented.

Extras:

Extras for this release include a theatrical trailer (2 minutes 41 seconds, Dolby Digital mono French with removable English subtitles), a U.S. rerelease theatrical trailer (1 minutes 8 seconds, Dolby Digital mono English, no subtitles), a segment from the French television program Cinéma, featuring interviews with Carrière and actress Catherine Deneuve (7 minutes 17 seconds, Dolby Digital mono French with removable English subtitles), an interview with screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière (10 minutes 22 seconds, Dolby Digital mono English, no subtitles), a video piece featuring writer and sexual-politics activist Susie Bright and film scholar Linda Williams titled The Obscene Source of Desire (18 minutes 8 seconds, Dolby Digital mono English, no subtitles), an audio commentary with Michael Wood, author of the BFI Film Classics book Belle de jour, and a 30-page booklet with cast & crew information, an essay titled Tough Love written by Melissa Anderson, a 1970s interview with director Luis Buñuel titled Buñuel on Belle de Jour, and information about the transfer.

Summary:

Belle de Jour was directed by Luis Buñuel, a Spanish filmmaker who made most of his films in France and Mexico. Notable films he directed include L'Âge d'Or, The Exterminating Angel, Diary of a Chambermaid, and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie.

A housewife having intimacy problems with her husband awakens her libido when she becomes a prostitute.

Belle de Jour depicts a woman torn between tradition and temptation. Although it incorporates surrealism, much like many of Luis Buñuel's other films, this one stands out as his most sexually explicit work. When it comes to the sexual moments, they never feel exploitative, and they always further the narrative.

The opening setup is an exemplary example of misdirection; a husband and wife are having a romantic carriage ride, an argument ensues, and the husband pulls the carriage over and has his wife tied to a tree where his servant whips her backside. At the height of this moment, it is revealed that what we have been watching was a fantasy, the first of many moments throughout Belle de Jour. The wife's thoughts and desires are effectively expressed through these fantasy sequences.

Belle de Jour is also a story about a woman who leads a double life; in private she is timid, while in public with strangers she has no boundaries. Her inability to be intimate with someone she cares for is linked to a traumatic event from her childhood in which she was molested. Her sexual rendezvous with strangers help her understand and deal with her intimacy issues.

Catherine Deneuve (Repulsion), in the role of the protagonist, Séverine, aka "Belle de Jour," delivers a career-defining performance that is arguably her best. The pitch of her performance perfectly captures her character's current moods and state of mind. The rest of the performances are excellent, and the cast is filled with recognizable faces. Jean Sorel (A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin) in the role of the husband, Macha Méril (Deep Red) portrays Séverine’s friend, Michel Piccoli (Contempt) portrays the husband’s lecherous friend who secretly desires Séverine, and Pierre Clémenti (The Designated Victim) portrays Marcel, a criminal who she meets through her work as a prostitute and whose infatuation for her becomes deadly.

Though the narrative often blurs the line between reality and fantasy, it still unfolds in a linear way. Its narrative is flawlessly constructed, and it does a phenomenal job building to a tragic finale imbued with ambiguity. Visually Belle de Jour is overflowing with arresting moments, notably Séverine’s fantasies. Another notable aspect of Belle de Jour is its absence of a musical score; rather, various sounds are employed to enhance the atmosphere. In the end, Luis Buñuel directed numerous films that could be deemed masterpieces, yet it is Belle de Jour that remains his most defining work.

Belle de Jour gets an exceptional release from The Criterion Collection that comes with a solid audio/video presentation and insightful extras, highly recommended.

 

Written by Michael Den Boer