Early in The Last
Mistress,
a quietly sinister period drama based on Jules-Amédée
Barbey d'Aurevilly's scandalous 19th-century novel, a pair of old gossips
discuss the engagement of a virginal aristocrat to a notorious libertine. They
worry the naïve young woman is overmatched, but more ruinous still is the
possibility of love: "In love," one says, "the first to suffer has lost." And
with that, all the film's period trappings can no longer hide the act that
we're in the world of Catherine Breillat, the French director behind Fat
Girl, Romance, and other frank
chronicles of bedroom politics. For Breillat, love and exploitation go hand in
glove, because the more people give themselves over to each other, the more
vulnerable they become. And once two people share that lasting a connection, a
power struggle intensifies and the real suffering begins.
It's a deeply pessimistic
way of thinking, but The Last Mistress doesn't sink into the crude didacticism
that mars some of Breillat's work. As much as anything, it's about the stain of
experience and the inescapability of one's romantic history. When dashing
libertine Fu-ad Aît Aattou courts a young, uncomplicated beauty played by
Roxane Mesquida, he does so in part to wrest himself from a thorny past that
won't let him go so easily. For the past decade, Aattou has been immersed in an
on-again/off-again relationship with the tempestuous Asia Argento, a Spaniard
whom a friend once described as "a capricious flamenca who can outstare the
sun." Aattou has tried to put an end to their love-hate affair, but Argento
won't fade so quietly into the woodwork.
Given their reputations as
feminist provocateurs, the coming together of Breillat and Argento seems
natural, even inevitable, and The Last Mistress gets a charge from their
feisty, uncompromising spirit. Though Argento's full-barreled performance hits
some bum notes, her utter lack of reserve stands out as both reckless and
courageous against the social rigors of Parisian high society. She's both
relentless in pursuing Aattou and powerless to quell her self-destructive
impulses; when she talks of the "bottomless abyss" of their caresses, it's the
perfect distillation of Breillat's feelings about relationships. For her, love
opens the door to jealousy, humiliation, and bone-deep pain, and it isn't easy
to close.