As far as I'm concerned the French Film Industry is, on the whole, the finest in the world with a history of excellence stretching back to the earliest days of cinema but the downside is the small minority of French film makers with a penchant for slogging through sewers in glass-bottomed boats and here Andre Techine takes his turn at the oars to bring us a story of provincial Nina (Juliette Binoche) who comes to Paris from Toulouse to bed every man she meets - at one point early on she tells the one more or less virtuous man in the film, Paulot (Wadek Stanczak) that she arriving in Paris she hasn't spent one night without a man - whilst ostensibly aspiring to an acting career. She takes up with the brutal Quentin (Lambert Wilson) who works in a sex show and attempts to persuade her to become his partner on stage and from there it more or less not only remains but wallows in the gutter. The acting, especially by Binoche, Wilson and Jean-Louis Trintignant is excellent but once again I must cite Brooks Atkinson and ask if it's possible to draw sweet water from a foul well.
Review of Rendez-vous
