Made in the 1980's and presented at the Cannes Film Festival in 1983 this superb film directed by Patrice Chereau and written by him and the writer Herve Guibert has never been given a certificate in the UK ( banned ? I have no idea ) and to my knowledge was shown once at the National Film Theatre during a gay season of films. To my knowledge it sank without trace after that and was brought out in the US in a copy that seemed like a copy of a copy and that I found unwatchable. I saw it when it originally came out in Paris and now I have it on a DVD from France in perfect condition. All this detail to ask simply why this great film, comparable to ' Sauvage ' has not been released and respected in our English speaking countries ? Most of Chereau's other films have, and Herve Guibert's work is not unknown in English. Is it because it was considered too savage and to my knowledge even the gay orthodoxy put it to one side ? I believe that the film should have been applauded for the brutality shown in male contact, and how a youth cannot understand such horror of sexual exploitation and how he allows himself to be drawn into it. It shows openly the confusion among men who really do not identify as being ' Gay ' and hang around train stations looking for sexuality. I hope it is not a spoiler that two wounded men are destroyed in an act of crazed love ( l'amour fou ) and it is us as a society that have led to this destruction. Mainstream cinemas showed it in France and I believe it paved the way for that marginal approach to homosexual subject matter that has led to some of the more braver directors of today.
