BAISE-MOI, based on the controversial novel written by codirector Virginie Despentes, is a vivid and brutal reality-based exploration of two women's attempts to reclaim their sexual power. Real-life porn stars Raffaela Anderson and Karen Bach star as the film's THELMA AND LOUISE-style anti-heros. Manu (Raffaela Anderson), a porn actress, is the victim of a violent gang rape, depicted graphically in the first fifteen minutes of the film, that fills her with internal rage and violent aggression. She sets out on a road trip and meets Delphine (Karen Bach), a drug-addled former prostitute with an aggressive streak. Delphine and Manu join forces and begin on a revenge-fueled sexual rampage, seducing and killing with reckless abandon. Delphine and Manu are furious and empowered by their sexual prowess; they wield their guns and lingerie-clad bodies like true professionals. Adrenaline drives their killing spree, set to a pounding punk rock score, and murder becomes implicitly linked to sexual gratification. Directors Virginie Despentes (a former prostitute) and Coralie Trinh Thi (a former porno actress) shot the film in gritty digital video at a fast-paced reckless clip of 76 minutes, heightening the acute sense of urgency and nihilistic desperation of the two women. Despentes and Trinh Thi blur the lines between cinema and reality and delve into the dark recesses of female psychology. By shooting real hard-core sex scenes and employing former porn actresses, they create a compelling and daring film that sets the conventional notions of female sexual appetite on end.
This angry, aggressive film explores female empowerment in terms of an equal right to revel in guilt-free sex and perform random acts of violence. It's a reasonable enough premise, particularly as Karen Bach and Raffaëla Anderson embark on their spree partly as a reaction to Anderson's rape. But while co-directors Virginie Despentes and Coralie Trinh Thi employ a rigorously grungy style to deglamorise the duo's brutal amorality (a tactic that is reinforced by the superficial characterisation of their victims), they also refuse to examine their motives, with the result that their actions become increasingly gratuitous and, therefore, less political or potent.
Radio Times
