Cruel Intentions Review
by "Steve Rhodes" (Steve DOT Rhodes AT InternetReviews DOT com)March 8th, 1999
CRUEL INTENTIONS
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 1999 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): * 1/2
Columbia Pictures, in their infinite wisdom, probably think they have found just the right high concept movie with CRUEL INTENTIONS to bring in those plentiful teen dollars. They have made another film adaptation of the French novel, "Les Liaisons Dangereuses," for what seems like the millionth time, but with a highly marketable twist. They have cast it with young heartthrobs, which will undoubtedly fill the theaters with teenagers looking for guilty pleasures, not that they will find many.
That the movie is actually one big tease shouldn't be a problem. They hope to bluff the young target audiences by having the actors do little more than talk incessantly and foully about sex.
The setup for the movie has Kathryn Merteuil-Valmont making a bet with her evil half-brother, Sebastian Valmont, who has never met a virgin he couldn't deflower. She says he will never be able to have sex with Annette Hargrove, the daughter of their school's new headmaster, since Annette wrote a famous article in a national teen magazine, vowing to remain chaste until married. Kathryn offers unlimited sexual access to her own body if Sebastian succeeds in his conquest of Annette. If he fails, Kathryn gets his prized antique sports car.
The casting sounds better than it turns out thanks to Roger Kumble's lackluster writing and directing. Kumble, an ex-video store clerk, reportedly learned directing by listening to directors giving advice on laser disks. (It's a good thing that there aren't laser disks with 747 pilots giving how-to lessons. There aren't, are there?) Who would have ever guessed it possible to make this story as flat as Sebastian's bed and as lifeless as the stone figurines that stand stoically outside the lavish Valmont mansion?
The only character that sporadically works is that of Kathryn, played by Sarah Michelle Gellar, last seen delightfully in SIMPLY IRRESISTIBLE. When she tempts her brother with hot incestuous sex, she undulates evil. And when she "rubs" it in later that he isn't making much headway in his seduction of Annette, she introduces the only genuinely erotic scenes in a movie that should be bursting with them. Mainly however, she just looks trashy and crude as she snorts cocaine out of her crucifix and slinks around on beds. "Practice makes perfect," she advises the young and innocent Cecile Caldwell (Selma Blair). "My advice is to sleep with as many men as possible."
As Sebastian, Ryan Phillippe looks the part but never acts it. Instead, he postures a lot as he reads his line, with cocky sexual pouting. Never convincingly evil, he should have been replaced by someone who could be nasty enough for us to hate. He comes closer to boring us to death than enraging us, no matter how many kinky sexual acts he gets to discuss. Even when given juicy lines -- "I'm tired of sleeping with these insipid Manhattan debutantes. There's nothing that can shock them anymore." -- his heart never seems in it. When Sebastian should be coldly calculating, Ryan reduces him to merely being cold.
After her wonderful performance in PLEASANTVILLE as the girl who brought sex to the town, Reese Witherspoon is an emotional zero as Annette, the girl who boasts to the world that she wants nothing to do with sex.
Typical of the movie is its music. Rather than forming images of evil seduction in our minds, the jarring, staccato sounds are rather like a form of water torture. Drip, drip, drip, the music pulses to the same excruciatingly slow pace as the film. Relief finally comes in the form of ending credits.
CRUEL INTENTIONS mercifully runs just 1:30. It is rated R for strong sexual dialogue and sexual situations involving teens, profanity and drug use. The film would be acceptable only for the oldest and most mature teens.
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