It is not a perfect film, it has flaws, the most obvious being the pseudo psycho babble that could have been achieved with greater effect by having said less, but having said it better. It is a romance, it is romantic, it is sexy, and it is a slice of life, their lives, a small part that keeps the rest of their lives from being without charm. There is no need to contemplate the past or their futures but the moments that make the present happiness complete. The film proves that sex between mature adults can be beautiful, and not bound by the petty mores of witless societies that demand sex take place between pnuematically enhanced teenagers and souless males who would not understand the rhythms of sex without a street directory. Nathalie Baye was 51 when she made this film and has an attractive body, but she has a great way of making herself erotically desirable. Any person that has never laughed, joked or cried during sex has not had much good sex. It is the casual and caring ease between the leads that demonstrates how sex can be imtimate and romantic and caring. The people who call this movie cold have looked at it from the director's eyes and have failed to capture the warmth of the two leads. The title, I think is in the French style of ironic (a word missing from the American dictionary) rather than the British sense of the word. While the British treat irony like a Shakespearean tragedy the French equate it more with the "little death" and regard it more as humour tainted with pathos. The French idea of tragedy is to leave the ending out of movies, but perhaps I am over using irony here. If you have 80 minutes to spare to think about the relationships in your own life, then this little movie just might help you explore your own heart a little more. And remember a movie without flaws is called, "Looney Tunes."
Review of An Affair of Love
