After playing Amelie, the bizarre personal qualities of Audrey Tautou which I never thought could be so perfectly matched to any other role were once again matched just as perfectly to this extreme role, in which she delivers one of the greatest psychotic character creations in the history of the cinema. How can such a smiling, angelic, elfin creature as the delightful Audrey possibly be so completely and dangerously insane? Well, they say that psychotics smile too much, and this proves it. This is a study in extreme 'erotomania'. Lest that be misunderstood, I need to stress that there is not one erotic scene in this film, and that the word refers to a psychotic love fixation on someone you barely know, or perhaps don't know at all. I don't want to give too much away, but I need to say that the film shows the story from two points of view, hers (Audrey's) and his (Samuel Le Bihan, who is inspired and harrowing as the object of the obsession). The script is so spectacularly brilliant and ingeniously-plotted that this film joins 'l'Appartement' and 'Tell No One' as one of the best-crafted thriller scripts of the last twenty years in any country. It was written by the director Laetitia Colombani (aged 31/2, the same as Audrey Tautou) and Caroline Thivel. They should have had a Cesar for it. The direction is wonderful, paced to perfection, inspired, chilling, indeed terrifying. What a triumph. And anyone who believed Audrey Tautou could not surpass herself was wrong.
Review of He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not
He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not
(2002)
A Brilliant Study of Love Obsession from Two Angles
3 January 2008