Love Is the Perfect Crime

A magnificent and intoxicating serial killer film set in the icy landscapes of Switzerland. Everything revolves around Marc, a sensualist and disturbed literature professor. His extremely literary way of expressing himself is undoubtedly impossible to apply in real life, but verisimilitude is not necessary. His intensity is fabulous, especially the way he looks at women, the way he fills his eyes and mind with them. Mathieu Amalric is just fantastic in this role. Note the excellent music of Caravaggio, subtle electronic tracks which embrace the rounded modernity of the university where Marc works. The Larrieu brothers once again excel in maintaining a floating and uncertain spirit in the film, whose main character gradually, almost voluptuously, loses his footing. Wonderful.

Terrific snowbound locations are pretty much the only asset of this inert, predictable, overlong thriller. Mathieu Amalric is miscast as a middle-aged Don Juan (he is so irresistible that young girls PAY HIM to spend some private time with him, and even his sister cannot keep her hands off him). Maïwenn is also miscast as a femme fatale. *1/2 out of 4.

The movie is so strange that probably even its creators don't know what they wanted to say. There's a lot of snow accompanied by endless tobacco smoking, sexually obsessed girls, sick professor and pointless dialogs. There's no thrill in this thriller, and there's no decent acting. However, the landscape and the urban design are really beautiful, and that's why I added one point. This is a movie that would've been much, much better if nobody filmed it.

When I have seen the good actresses and actors with a great backbround, I really thought this movie would be a good thriller.

And unfortunately, such a movie is a really a shame for these well-known actors.

I was completely bored all along.

L'amour est un crime parfait or Love is the Perfect Crime has two big things going for it. They are in no specific order; the gorgeous alpine locations and interesting post-modern university settings and the first act which intriguingly does manage to hook you into hanging around for the final outcome.

Unfortunately the second and third acts are increasingly filled with so many red herrings and almost unbelievably melodramatic contrivances on the part of the script writers, we know before we get there that the denouement will be unsatisfactory in the extreme. And so it proves to be.

We are never presented with a motive/reason for the first killing/murder, though sleep-walking (LOL!) is suggested. There is no real reason given for the siblings' odd relationship, apart from a mention that "their mother was too hard on them". Wow! I wondered why there was (plainly) an over-emphasis on the protagonist's smoking (to ridiculous lengths) in the film. And it was clearly to set up the climax with a bang. And seriously, if a big time gangster wanted to intimidate/investigate a character, I could never see them going to the theatrical lengths that are presented in this shaggy dog joke of a film.

The big reveal/twist when it appears is just laughable and just adds to the evidence that like a cheap Christmas gift gaudily packaged, Love is the Perfect Crime is all style with little substance.