Mademoiselle

Tony Richardson's 1966 film is a French village nightmare written by Jean Genet and Marguerite Duras. The schoolteacher played by Jeanne Moreau discharges her repressed desire through a chain of deliberate accidents: she starts fires, poisons animals, causes floods. The man blamed is an immigrant Italian woodcutter, who is also the object of her desire. The film presents repression itself as a form of violence and leaves the viewer no moral ground to stand on. Genet's text goes back to 1951 and Georges Franju was originally to direct; when that fell apart the script reached Richardson through Moreau. By Richardson's account, Genet worked on it in London for two hours every day until the director complimented him on his reliability, whereupon he vanished the next day. The film met hostile reviews on release. Who it's for: viewers interested in the work of Genet and Duras, in rural nightmares, and in Jeanne Moreau's acting. Who it's not for: anyone avoiding animal cruelty and sexual violence, or looking for an explanation of the character.