Post coïtum animal triste (1997)
Directed by Brigitte Roüan

Film Review

Have established herself as an actress of some ability, working with filmmakers of the calibre of Alain Resnais and Jacques Rivette, Brigitte Roüan embarked on her directing career in 1985 with a well-received short, Grosse (1985).  Her first feature, Outremer, came five years later, and in 1996 she made Post coïtum animal triste, an intimate and intensely true-to-life portrayal of a married woman living through the upheavals of an illicit love affair in middle-age.  The subject matter is hardly original, and Rouan's attempts to bring an original perspective through the use of flash-forwards and fancy camerawork often feel like needlessly arty distractions, but overall the film succeeds in conveying the psychological impact of the affair on its main protagonists - the woman desperately seizing what may be her last chance of happiness and the husband who, lacerated by his feelings of betrayal, agonises over how he should react.

Roüan not only directed the film - with more somewhat maturity and restraint than her subsequent offering Travaux, on sait quand ça commence (2003) - she also took on the lead role, with a suitably dour Patrick Chesnais cast as the cheated husband.  Even though Roüan is on screen for most of the time, it is Chesnais who is most successful in arousing our sympathies, and this obvious imbalance does to tend to mar the film a little.  Add to this some deficiencies on the writing front (which the fragmentary narrative and odd choice of camera angles cannot disguise) and Roüan's inexperience as a filmmaker becomes all too apparent.  Despite this, Post coïtum animal triste is a worthy take on a familiar theme, a tad self-conscious in places, but engaging through the dogged honesty with which it broaches its delicate subject matter.

Film Synopsis

Diane Clovier is a woman in her forties who has made a success of both her professional life and her domestic life.  She is married to Philippe, a busy lawyer, has two teenage children and works for a thriving publishing company.  Through one of the aspiring young writers she is mentoring, she gets to meet a handsome Italian Emilio, who is twenty years her junior.  Diane is easily seduced by the hot-blooded Emilio and the two are soon pursuing the most passionate of love affairs, which the former does everything she can to conceal from her family and friends.  Diane is ready to leave her family and start a new life with her demanding lover, but Emilio sees this as nothing more than a passing infatuation.  Then comes the fateful day when Emilio tells Diane that he must stop seeing her.  By this time Philippe is certain that his wife has been having an affair and contemplates his next move...