The "confusion" here is more a plethora, an embarrassment of riches and of choices. At the center of every scene is bisexual (or is he just gay?) lawyer Alain (Pascal Greggory). Everybody wants him, or thinks he wants them -- handsome imprisoned murderer Marc (Vincent Martinez), cute gay boy Christophe (Cyrille Thouvenin), attractive and accomplished law partner Laurence (Nathalie Richard, who's more Alain's age); the prisoner's (former) girlfriend Babette (Julie Gayet); Marc's prison-mate Étienne (noted singer Alain Bashung) even gets amusingly involved at the end. Alain and his law partner are talking about marrying, and it's all practical and boring, except that it's impulsive too. Through it all Pascal Greggory has that bored, annoyed look he always has; but he registers a lot of other looks too -- he's a skillful movie actor and for good reason one of the busiest in France. This is very French, a sort of comedy of ill humor, sex, and indecision. The hilariously grumpy and irritable "haute bourgeoisie" relatives of Laurence and Alain who come into play when wedding bells are in the offing include the great Bulle Ogier as Laurence's mother. The various nude scenes aren't just titillation; they're all skillfully and sometimes hilariously illustrative of characters and situations and of Alain's "embarras du choix."
"La Confusion des genres" is dry and amusing and well paced and has an excellent cast but it's very French and you wouldn't necessarily expect it to go over well with Americans, and it didn't. US critics pretty much hated it. On Metacritic it got a 39. Many American viewers think it's pretentious and unfunny. They miss the witty but blunt dialogue (which all the French critics complement), and they don't appreciate Greggory, who's perfect here, or the delicately observed range of French social and personality types. This is as good a treatment of the pains and pleasures of the bisexual life as seen from the French 21st-century standpoint as, at the time, was John Schlesinger's very English (1971) "Sunday Bloody Sunday"; but as a movie it doesn't carry quite as much weight and clearly like some wines it does not travel well.
Doing the voice-over commentary in English for the American DVD didn't turn out very well either. Director Duran Cohen studied at NYU Film School and and is fluent, but he's paired with Greggory and Thouvenin, who're pretty tongue-tied, and the conversation never gets going. Why didn't they do it in French with subtitles as Kassovitz, Cassel, and Reno did so entertainingly for the US "Crimson Rivers" DVD? Then maybe they would have been more relaxed and talkative, as the "Crimson Rivers" team was, and something more informative would have resulted.
"La Confusion des genres" is dry and amusing and well paced and has an excellent cast but it's very French and you wouldn't necessarily expect it to go over well with Americans, and it didn't. US critics pretty much hated it. On Metacritic it got a 39. Many American viewers think it's pretentious and unfunny. They miss the witty but blunt dialogue (which all the French critics complement), and they don't appreciate Greggory, who's perfect here, or the delicately observed range of French social and personality types. This is as good a treatment of the pains and pleasures of the bisexual life as seen from the French 21st-century standpoint as, at the time, was John Schlesinger's very English (1971) "Sunday Bloody Sunday"; but as a movie it doesn't carry quite as much weight and clearly like some wines it does not travel well.
Doing the voice-over commentary in English for the American DVD didn't turn out very well either. Director Duran Cohen studied at NYU Film School and and is fluent, but he's paired with Greggory and Thouvenin, who're pretty tongue-tied, and the conversation never gets going. Why didn't they do it in French with subtitles as Kassovitz, Cassel, and Reno did so entertainingly for the US "Crimson Rivers" DVD? Then maybe they would have been more relaxed and talkative, as the "Crimson Rivers" team was, and something more informative would have resulted.