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12 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
They made films as challenging and funny as this once. It was called the 70s., 1 June 2000
8/10
Author: old troy of the d.m.p. (hitch1899_@hotmail.com) from dublin, ireland

Could you credit a film featuring an S&M dominatrix, a burly petty thief, and an all-powerful, mysterious businessman/probable pimp; a film which boasts elaborate scenes of bondage torture and mutilation, and a very graphic horse-slaughtering sequence, as well as more usual acts of petty thuggery, such as the hurling of a man down a stairs, or the drunken smashing of a bar-room window; could such a film be considered benevolent and optimistic? Because such is the ultimate feeling one gets from this weird, enigmatic, lovely film, once considered so scandalous it was banned in England, but now seems positively cuddly (the version I saw had four minutes cut. Go figure).

Olivier is a petty thief who meets up with an old friend, now a door-to-door salesman selling books on the Fine Arts. After a dismal lack of success, they come upon a woman, Ariane (hint of the spider?), panicking because her pipes have burst. The men fix the problem, and she says she'll write to the tenant beneath, currently on holiday. Seeing a chance for a quick clean out, the men break in downstairs, only to find a torture chamber, precision instruments of pain, racks, crucifixes, cages, in one of which creeps a cowering man, and a barking doberman.

This is the bondage chamber of Ariane, who descends from her own flat down metallic stairs in a fantastic rubber suit and cape, and blonde wig, admonishing the intruders. She asks Olivier to give her a hand with one of her clients, and they begin an affair. After getting over the shock of her profession, and initially content with his sponging life, he notices that Ariane has some kind of business relationship with the mysterious Gautier, whom he suspects to be her pimp. He goes to confront him.

Even by the mid-70s, the idea of bourgeois respectability being propped up by less socially acceptable means was hardly a revolutionary insight, and MAITRESSE seems less progressive than, say, BELLE DE JOUR, with an ending that is depressingly patriarchal or joyfully subversive, depending on how you read it. The film's success lies in its sustaining of enigma, with Olivier as our guide to the many mysteries Ariane raises. How did she get the money to set up such an operation (and the S&M chamber is an extraordinary, metallic, futuristic contraption, full of thematically pointed mirrors and ice-blue neon)? Who is this mysterious Gautier - a Godot-like figure, always expected but never arriving? What does Ariane do by day? Why does she go too the country manor? Where are her family?

Olivier's turning from a thief into a detective is part of his - and, by association, our, the viewer's - quest to explain Ariane, to deprive her of her power, which results precisely from her mystery. The bondage sessions, with those four minutes cut, are less an anthropological expose than comic (and some of them are very funny), and a literalisation of the real S&M that is going on, the power struggle between Ariane and Olivier, between the female bread-winner and her male dependent. Olivier says he wants to protect Ariane because she's scared, but he really wants to take over from Gautier in controlling her

Olivier's increasing minimalising in the film is striking - having begun on his motorbike, the centre of interest, free, driving the action; from taking over his friend's job, bullying the clients, setting the plot in motion; he becomes a marginal figure, sulking from the sidelines, with nothing to do but observe like us, useless, uncomprehending, bait in a conspiracy theory that's making fun of him. This is an unusual act of restraint for an actor of Depardieu's munificence, and is communicated with visual bluntness - who would we rather look at: a hefty beefcake in a sweat-soaked singlet, or a beautiful housewife putting on the most fascinating outfits and make-up, like an actress at her dressing table?

The style of the film adds to the air of paranoia and uncertainty. Having been told that the cuts related simply to the more extreme forms of mutilation, I assume that the ellipses and contradictions are part of the narrative method. This is all the more jolting because Schroeder's very full mise-en-scene seems to give us all the information we need, but how can we know anything when we identify with a character from whom everything is concealed? Seemingly realistic scenes turn out to be role-play and vice-versa (the Schroeder-Ogier connection with Rivette isn't as implausible here as you might first think). Schroeder refuses to make it easier by explanatory close-ups or expressive acting. The best thing is just to sit back and enjoy the confusion.

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11 out of 12 people found the following comment useful :-
A shocking but moving film experience, 17 February 2004
Author: Aaron C. Schepler from Arizona USA

MAÎTRESSE (1973) **** Gérard Depardieu, Bulle Ogier, André Rouyer, Nathalie Keryan. In this Barbet Schroeder film, Olivier (Depardieu) burglarizes the apartment of a dominatrix named Ariane (Ogier). After Ariane catches him in the act, the two fall in love and Olivier struggles to accept his girlfriend's bizarre profession. In the uncut version, some of the torture scenes (which were purportedly filmed using real-life "slaves" of a real-life dominatrix) are truly painful to watch, and are undoubtedly some of the most shocking ever to appear in a non-pornographic movie. Which leads one to ask: Is Maîtresse an artsy exploitation flick disguised as a love story, or simply a love story that makes legitimate use of graphic (and violent) sexual imagery? Either way, the film is moving, provocative and impossible to forget. Highly recommended.

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6 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
Enjoyable feast of a film!, 11 April 2000
Author: fearhaven (fearhaven@yahoo.com) from Durham, England

Before I saw this film I was warned that the film contains quite a few explicit sexual ideas and images but I have to say that I found the film to be a beautiful romantic .It isn't a conventional romance ,rather extreme if I dare to say,but nevertheless you can easily identify yourself with some of the scenes.Me personally would categorise this film as an Atmospheric Romantic.quite self-explanatory!

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2 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Not quite as brave as it thinks it is, 25 January 2008
7/10
Author: fuzon from London, England

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Strange, cold film about a petty thief who becomes the lover of a dominatrix. The most intriguing thing is the design of her abode, which has a petit bourgeois apartment above a dungeon, linked by a ladder which can be let down or drawn up to gain access. The implication of this seems to be that there's a link between the pleasures derived from a BDSM scene and those derived from a more normative relationship - in the end, both are about pleasure and power. Some haunting scenes, especially one where a horse is killed in a knacker's yard. Depardieu's performance is typical of his 70s studies of masculinity in crisis.

The film is a kind of celebration of risk taking - the characters at the denouement foreshadow Cronenberg's auto-perverts in Crash - and a "do your own thing" type of liberation narrative. That the script doesn't excavate either where Ogier's wealthy clients get their money, nor the effect their exhibitionism and risk-taking might have on innocent by-standers shows that, whilst director Schroeder might think he has the gumption to explore "dangerous" and "outrageous" subject matter, he doesn't have the guts to really delve into the social implications of his characters and their lifestyles.

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2 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Like Von Sacher-Masoch's 'Venus in Furs', it's good when they get down to it, 20 May 2004
7/10
Author: Moe Tavern from Ireland

*** NB: THIS COMMENT MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS. ***

The costumes in particular are dismayingly authentic and convincing, recalling original fetish heroine Diana Rigg in 60's TV series 'The Avengers.' Spike-heel ankleboots, trousers, corset, cloak and gloves all in the sleekest of black leather; add to this a purple velvet shawl, a perfect black wig and Bull Ogier's timeless bemused innocence, and a masochist's screen starlet is born. Her spot-on kinkiness is, if anything, a more cultivated progression on her English predecessor: one gruesome episode aside, she does precisely all the things you wished Emma Peel would do. In short, Schroeder's feature's impact is greatest at its most simple and straightforwardly visual i.e. when Arianne dons the leathers, wields her whips and coolly dispenses the sport to her minions. If (like me) this is your chief interest in the film - and it might well be - then yes, certainly, do seek it out.

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3 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Watchable, but hardly shocking, 5 April 2000
6/10
Author: Afracious from England

I watched a cut version of this film, but it was still not very startling. Olivier (Gerard Depardieu) is a burglar who breaks into the house of Ariane (Bulle Ogier), a dominatrix. She decides to let him go, and Olivier asks her to dinner. She accepts and they soon fall in love. But this love has many problems. Olivier is envious, and struggles to accept Ariane's job, fulfilling the fantasies of perverted wealthy men, especially a mysterious one named Gauthier, who Olivier later confronts. There are mild scenes of sadomasochism and unusual sexual behaviour, but nothing that shocks. Maybe it was diluted slightly by the cut version I watched. Gerard Depardieu and Bulle Ogier are both good as the lead characters. It is watchable, and a fairly enjoyable tale.

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can't believe there aren't more severely critical reviews of this movie, 7 March 2009
2/10
Author: marymorrissey from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

what a phony fine romance this is. and what about the fact that Gerard appears to totally slit someone's throat towards the end of the film? I mean, he's become a bit of a DRAG to the audience at this point, one can only imagine what his girlfriend thinks. and why can't she just tell him Gaultier is not her pimp and that he's probably investing her money? of course we don't know what's up with the bank acct he starts at her instruction. and when he's in the bank again... it's not at all clear what's up, is he retrieving chump change that's all that's left in the account to go leave as a valentine? if so, what's so moving about that? it just seems another instance of his being a complete idiot. for this film to succeed there needed to be some way of making their relationship more believable. it was interesting when he took charge with her once the dog was out of the room the first time. but when it ends up with him raping her and her kicking him out... it should have just stayed that way... the scene at the slaughter house was totally gratuitous, and since the process has been depicted in much better films, all the more so. the best part of this film was the fetish sequences, the rest of it was pure hokum.

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Making their own world together, 30 January 2007
8/10
Author: Polaris_DiB from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Going into this movie, I was expecting a slightly typical "man finds subculture, man gets involved with subculture, man gets obsessed with subculture" story that tends to involve such things as this film portrays, S&M and the like. Actually, though the story is slightly structured along those lines, this movie has the audacity to bring something completely new into the mix: less a focus on the weirdness and ambiguity of a stigma subculture and more an analysis of an awkward kind of love... but a love it is.

What's interesting in this movie is the relationship between the two leads--it's actually a very healthy and loving relationship, a better portrayal of a good relationship than I've seen in most movies and even in real life. These two actually seem to care for each other, make sacrifices for each other, and even when making mistakes forgive each other. What more could you ask for? The upstairs/downstairs imagery in this movie tends to provide analyses of "one world/other world" in reviews, but I'd like to point out that it's when the two of them leave the apartment entirely and go out into the forest (make their own world, so to speak), that they finally are completely together. Depardieu eating the horse meat may be a symbol of his need to be a victim too, but ultimately the relationship is not consumed by the alternative desires of the world below--the direction a narrative of this type tends to go. The two of them are ultimately not obsessed so much with the lower level or secure in the upper level as they just need somewhere to just be themselves, something they provide to each other but not get from others (Depardieu's character's subjection to peer pressure, Olgier's character's lack of actual sexual contact with her customers).

The portrayal of S&M gets a lot of attention, of course, but I agree that Schroeder and his cinematographer did it very well... not too close and not too far. It's strikingly nonjudgmental and unemotional, leaving the drama and analysis to the characters and what it means to their relationship. It's a strong feat considering the aforementioned stigma.

--PolarisDiB

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Revealing in several ways.., 21 August 2005
9/10
Author: p-hynes from United Kingdom

Story of the power struggle of a professional Dominatrix and her Alph- male boyfriend. Olivier (Gérard Depardieu)is the brutish & confused sponger boyfriend trying to show who's boss to Ariane, the professional Dominatrix. Despite their new relationship his interfering starts to make things difficult for her 'buisiness', aspects of which are shown in graphic style like a slave getting his bits nailed to a piece of 2 by 4. Also interesting to note is that S&m today doesn't seem much different than it was in '76 (note the ballet shoes & other accoutrement's).

A great film, photography and story-wise(but which could have done without the horse slaughter scene). However if I could edit out other parts of this film also, it would be the hulking Neanderthal thug Depardieu depicts (admittly well). Then I would watch this film a million times just for seeing the beautiful Bulle Ogiers Ariane.

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1 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Where am I? Who is who? ... and no conclusive answers, 24 July 2006
9/10
Author: manuel-pestalozzi from Zurich, Switzerland

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

In my opinion this is quite a serious movie about desires, power and commerce. I found certain very graphic scenes of torture and humiliation hard to take, and I suspect that there must be different versions around. I must hasten to say that nothing I saw seemed to me gratuitous and that Maitresse is anything but an exploitation movie. It deals with the issue masochism openly and with an honest curiosity, in that aspect almost like a documentary. However, after seeing it I am more puzzled than before – but probably that was the intention of the makers of his movie.

Maitresse is very carefully constructed. A young man comes to Paris and teams up with a professional burglar. They pretend to be door-to-door art book dealers so they can find out which flats are empty. A very nervous woman begs them after some hesitation into her spacious flat. She needs their help as her bath tub is overflowing. Asking her if she is not concerned about the downstairs neighbors, she says that they are away on a holiday. That, of course, is the sign for the two to strike the next night. What they see in the light of their torches there are latex clothes, torture instruments and even a gallows ready for use. The older man's reaction: It's all cheap, unsellable stuff, let's get out. Then the ray of their flashlight hits a cage with an old naked man crouching in it, then from the ceiling a folding staircase is lowered and the woman from the day before descends, together with a fierce dog called Texas.

I decided to describe this opening scenes because they set the tone. A large part of the movie is about deceiving, pretending and make believe which seems to be one of the major kicks masochists get out of their apparently precisely timed rituals. It seemed evident to me that the woman planned the burglary in order to lay her hands on the young hunk played by a then not yet famous Gerard Depardieu. Apart from an instant sexual attraction there evolves a kind of a love story as the man moves into the (upstairs) apartment (the movable staircase, incidentally is hidden underneath a coffee table with Chinese wood inlays). But commercial interests are never far. The woman clearly expects him to participate in the business giving her an occasional helping hand. He, for his part, thinks that maybe more money could be squeezed out of the enterprise. But he abhors bodily maltreatment. Before he moved to Paris, so he tells, he worked in a slaughterhouse and could not stand it getting used to the slaughter ritual. The whole business rather sickens and stuns him. The prevailing nature of the couple's relationship never becomes clear up to the enigmatic final scene. And strangely, this is an asset here.

As to the issue of masochism, the movie bluntly states that there are people who are in need of being occasionally tortured and humiliated. And that it is no easy issue with devastating emotional effects. These people are the woman's customers and expect full service. No doubt is left that they are rich and influential to the point of being above the law. It also becomes apparent that they leave very precise directions as to how they want to be treated – it is as horrific as it is dull and uninspired, the movie shows even that. Sometimes the directives become too much even for the experienced dominatrix.

The question of who is on top and who is under the heel (here: literally) becomes a new, rather quirky significance. The upstairs/downstairs situation in the woman's establishment shows this masterfully. The movie makes it clear that the downstairs people have the say. After all, they are the customers. Those upstairs are merely servants. So, why not just quit? The couple makes an open end attempt in that direction in the final scenes of this interesting, thought provoking movie.

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