The provocative cover image of a blood-spattered Beatrice Dalle only hints at the ferocity within Claire (Chocolat, Beau Travail) Denis' sad, haunting study of sex and cannibalism that caused record walkouts and faintings at its Cannes screening.
The voracious, predatory Core (Betty Blue's Dalle) is boarded up in a secluded Paris house by her husband, the errant scientist Leo (Alex Descas). She periodically escapes, seduces passing motorists and in sickening detail, methodically consumes her prey. Her fate is connected to a visiting American doctor Shane Brown (a seedy, unshaven, troubled-looking Vincent Gallo) on his honeymoon in Paris, apparently a test subject for Leo's experiments in unleashing the libido, and who is already having violent masturbatory fantasies of his gorgeous new bride (Tricia Vessey) covered in blood. "I will never hurt you," he whispers to his concerned wife, already showing a tell-tale bite mark on her shoulder.
Trouble Every Day is simply and beautifully shot, and while not as blatantly pornographic as Romance or Anatomy Of Hell, it has a dangerous and electric eroticism that's hard to shake. Wide-eyed Dalle says little yet conveys an air of both tragedy and primal appetite and doesn't overplay her animalism, while Gallo (Buffalo 66) is at his greasy, neurotic best. Its slow pace and spare action deliberately unfold the story in a distinctly European fashion; at the one hour mark the film switches from carnal to charnal, spiraling toward a grotesque and shattering crescendo worthy of the great excesses of the 70s art film. Stunning.
The voracious, predatory Core (Betty Blue's Dalle) is boarded up in a secluded Paris house by her husband, the errant scientist Leo (Alex Descas). She periodically escapes, seduces passing motorists and in sickening detail, methodically consumes her prey. Her fate is connected to a visiting American doctor Shane Brown (a seedy, unshaven, troubled-looking Vincent Gallo) on his honeymoon in Paris, apparently a test subject for Leo's experiments in unleashing the libido, and who is already having violent masturbatory fantasies of his gorgeous new bride (Tricia Vessey) covered in blood. "I will never hurt you," he whispers to his concerned wife, already showing a tell-tale bite mark on her shoulder.
Trouble Every Day is simply and beautifully shot, and while not as blatantly pornographic as Romance or Anatomy Of Hell, it has a dangerous and electric eroticism that's hard to shake. Wide-eyed Dalle says little yet conveys an air of both tragedy and primal appetite and doesn't overplay her animalism, while Gallo (Buffalo 66) is at his greasy, neurotic best. Its slow pace and spare action deliberately unfold the story in a distinctly European fashion; at the one hour mark the film switches from carnal to charnal, spiraling toward a grotesque and shattering crescendo worthy of the great excesses of the 70s art film. Stunning.