Maitresse

The trained viewer will find the approach to this story very refreshing. The Hollywood formulas get very stale and this is no where near a cliche .
The dialogue is natural and intriguing. The characters are played with empathy. This movie is very elegant yet done with a very quiescent sense of realism. This quiescence ,in my opinion, contributes to the feel of the film, but to conventional film viewers it may seem a bit slow at times.
The best feature of this product is actually the interview with Barbet Schroeder the director. He is charming and once you get a taste for his style you will become much more discriminating in your movie critiques.
This item is worth it for collectors, and film connoisseurs.

In this Barbet Schroeder film, Olivier (Depardieu) burglarizes the apartment of a dominatrix named Ariane (Ogier). After Ariane catches him in the act, the two fall in love and Olivier struggles to accept his girlfriend's bizarre profession. In the uncut Criterion version, some of the torture scenes (which were purportedly filmed using real-life "slaves" of a real-life dominatrix) are truly painful to watch, and are undoubtedly some of the most shocking ever to appear in a non-pornographic movie. Which leads one to ask: Is Maîtresse an artsy exploitation flick disguised as a love story, or simply a love story that makes legitimate use of graphic (and violent) sexual imagery? Either way, the film is moving, provocative, and impossible to forget. Highly recommended.

Four stars out of five.

Gérard Depardieu as Olivier enters an apartment in order to rob the place, but unknowingly breaks into a haven for sadomasochistic fantasies. During the burglary he encounters Ariane (Bulle Ogier) who he had met earlier, but this time she is a dominatrix who controls situations as she dives into other people's madness. Ariane is an interesting character that separates her life and her profession as skillfully as do her slaves who consist of lawyers, judges, and other high ranked individuals who seek punishment from her. Her cruel punishment is well molded after her "slave's" desires which consists of all forms of torture and degradation. Olivier is spellbound by Ariane as he falls in love with her, and it leads him into a scorching affair where he is bound to be burnt as he is mystified by Ariane's dark trade. Schroeder's creation of Ariane's dual nature can be seen through her use of a downstairs apartment for her dark fantasies and her upstairs apartment for more accepted desires. In addition, it can also be observed symbolically that the two sides coexists and never are entirely separated as Ariane brings her make-up, clothes, and feelings back upstairs. Maîtresse is an avant-garde film as it explores in-depth the theme of sadomasochistic fantasies and its sub-culture as set in a love story. As a cinematic experience, Maîtresse offers a shocking, for the unaware, experience that tells an intriguing story which imprisons the curiosity.