[An] entertaining, elegantly shot adaptation of Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly's 19th century novel.
Comment
10/18/08
The Last Mistress (2008)
75
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:91
Fresh:68
Rotten:23
Average Rating:6.7/10
Consensus: More complicated than your average bodice ripper, Catherine Breillat's Last Mistress features beautiful costumes, wrought romances, and a feral performance from Argento.
Theatrical Release:Jun 27, 2008 Limited
Box Office: $621,567
Synopsis: Controversial director Catherine Breillat (ROMANCE, FAT GIRL) delivers her most ambitious film yet with THE LAST MISTRESS. Adapted from the novel by Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly, the film is set in... [More]
Starring: Asia Argento, Fu'ad Ait Aattou, Roxane Mesquida, Claude Sarraute
Director: Catherine Breillat
Reviews for The Last Mistress
Top CriticDespite an austere budget and some minor anachronisms, The Last Mistress proves that Breillat has found something in the luscious language of the 19th century that makes sense to us today.
07/25/08
Top CriticBelieve it or not, Breillat paints a vivid and affecting portrait of this unhealthy, irresistible sexual obsession.
06/07/08
Swiftly and deftly immersing us in the fashions – not just the clothes and decor, but also the changing sexual and social ethics – of the 1830s, Breillat’s meticulous, eloquent script and direction succeed in relating a consistently engrossing story.
04/11/08
The Last Mistress is grindingly predictable, its view of sex as hand-to-hand combat (the lovers here assault each other like Sumo wrestlers) is often unintentionally funny and the casting is all wrong.
07/18/08
The sex, like almost everything else in The Last Mistress, is mechanical.
07/18/08
Top CriticA perfect showcase for Argento's carnal charms.
06/26/08
even as this odd couple cuts its destructive path through the social order in a story that is essentially a tragedy, they come across as idealised revolutionaries rather than deluded victims of love.
04/09/08
It is an outstandingly intelligent, formally pleasing film, and a fascinating development for Breillat herself.
10/18/08
Asia Argento is the lively center of a sometimes meandering tale of sexual intrigue.
10/11/07
Slave to love... and pride... and obsession. And, Argento!
07/12/08
The adventures of a handsome libertine, his sexy Spanish mistress, and the beautiful young woman he is engaged to marry.
10/08/07
Cool, carnal, and lethal, The Last Mistress is a period drama with a difference.
07/25/08
Top CriticThere’s plenty of skin and acrobatic positioning in Catherine Breillat’s The Last Mistress, but the ferocious passions they signify are far more interesting.
08/22/08
Breillat's latest presents one of the great performances of this year and the director's most accessible work to date
06/26/08
This is an offbeat adaptation (by Breillat) of the controversial 19th century novel by Jules-Amedee Barbey d'Aurevilly that benefit from its new millennium character, Vellini, played with gusto by Asia Argento.
07/11/08
Breillat's most accessible film, but she does not compromise...Asia Argento eats the screen alive...It's an oversized performance, just on the verge of lunacy.
07/06/08
Visually, the film is an uninteresting as the similarly dour Don’t Touch the Axe, and now Breillat’s health is failing it may be time she hung-up her viewfinder.
04/11/08
In The Last Mistress, the director Catherine Breillat’s explorations of desire are so far from the antiseptic world of most screen depictions as to seem far out.
06/27/08
Top Critic[Breillat's] movies often seem more clinical than insightful, more biological than emotional. This time, by braiding the desires of her male and female characters instead of letting one oppress the other, she's found an appealing balance.
06/26/08
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May 25, 2008:
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