Love Crime (Rhoades)

“Love Crime” More

Dangerous Than

“Working Girl”

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

Think of “Love Crime” (original title: “Crime d’amour”) as “Working Girl” retold as a French thriller. Instead of Sigourney Weaver and Melanie Griffith struggling for the control of an account (and Harrison Ford), here we have Kristin Scott Thomas doing battle with her assistant Ludivine Sagnier.

Christine (Scott Thomas) is manager of the Paris branch of Barney Johnson, a company that specializes in marketing food products. Isabelle (Sagnier) is ambitious and hard working, but crafty Christine takes credit for her assistant’s work. Both are having an affair with the same colleague. Ruthless Christine delights in toying with Isabelle, but you can expect the tables to turn as Isabelle exacts her revenge.

Sadly, “Love Crime” is French director Alain Corneau’s last film. He died a week after its premiere. He’s best remembered for “Tous les matins du monde,” his 17th Century musical drama.

You will recognize Kristin Scott Thomas from “The English Patient” and “The Horse Whisperer.” She mostly makes films in France these days.

And Ludivine Sagnier is known for Francois Ozon’s psychosexual “Swimming Pool.”

With “Love Crime” we learn that corporate warfare can be dangerous. So this film is at heart a murder mystery … with no mystery.

srhoades@aol.com
[from Solares Hill]