With DAMAGE, based on the novel by Josephine Hart, acclaimed French director Louis Malle has created one of the most passionless movies about passion ever to hit the screen. Married, successful Member of Parliament Dr. Stephen Fleming (Jeremy Irons) becomes immediately infatuated when he
meets Anna Barton (Juliette Binoche), girlfriend of his newspaper editor son, Martyn (Rupert Graves). The two begin an intensely erotic affair that continues even after Martyn announces that he and Anna are to be married. After discovering Anna and his father making love, a stunned Martyn falls to
his death from the apartment balcony, setting off a scandal that will leave Stephen's life and career in ruins.
DAMAGE's plot is pure soap opera melodrama, but Malle imbues the material with an almost morbid seriousness that matches David Hare's irony-free screenplay. Strangely enough, the sex scenes are so mechanical that the ratings controversy that colored the film's release now seems ridiculous: no one
could possibly find this material erotic. Stephen and Anna's many couplings look cold, clinical and--especially when lit through Venetian blinds--terminally arty. Irons, of course, is excellent. leave a comment
