Yannick Bellon is a female André Cayatte:not only she broaches serious subjects as he did before her (homosexuality ("la triche" ); breast cancer ("l'amour nu" );ecology ("l'affût" )) but she also uses Cayatte's actress in " les risques du métier" -about a schoolteacher falsely accused of child abuse- ,Natalie Nell.
Bellon's film deals with rape.It's probably her most successful movie,since it was made at a time women were (I hope it has changed)often reluctant to tell their family and friends about what "happened" .Yannick Bellon succeeds in making us feel her disgust for human bestiality:the rape scene lasts about ten minutes and does not turn the viewer into a peeping tom;her heroine's sufferings are so intense we often feel like looking away.
Bellon is feminism flesh on the bone: a very interesting sequence takes place in the school where children's drawings show how a woman 's work is never done:while dad's is working,or watching TV,or reading his newspaper ,mum's cooking,ironing,etc ,not even PTAing.The children's games are also revealing :even when they play ,girls cannot take boys' parts.OK it was in 1978 and times have changed.And Bellon's work may seem superficial and one-sided.But this scene when the victim's MOTHER tells her daughter that NOTHING can be done,that if you're born a woman you're born to be hurt is really spooky.Her boyfriend's attitude is a coward one even if he redeems himself at the end.
"L'amour violé" may be a dated movie.But things like that are still happening,still in 2005.It's a movie that needed to be done.
