Diabolique - Criterion Collection

Amazon.com essential video

Legend has it that Henri-Georges Clouzot beat out Alfred Hitchcock to secure the rights to this novel, which proved to be a veritable blueprint for an icy masterpiece of murder, mystery, and suspense. Véra Clouzot plays the sickly wife of a callous headmaster of a provincial boarding school going to seed, and the commanding Simone Signoret is the headmaster's mistreated mistress. Together they plot and carry out his murder, a brutal drowning that director Clouzot documents in chilly detail, but the corpse disappears, and a nosy detective starts sniffing around the grounds as threatening notes taunt the women. Clouzot's thriller is as precise and accomplished a work as anything in Hitchcock's canon, a film of grueling suspense and startling shocks in an overcast, gray world of decay, but his icy manipulations lack the human dimension and emotional resonance of the master of suspense. The film has been accused of being misanthropic by many critics, and Clouzot's attitude toward his characters is bitter at best, contemptuous at worst. The viewer is left on the outside looking in, but the razor precision and terrifying twists deliver a sleek, bleak spectacle worthy of attention. --Sean Axmaker

Description

An acknowledged influence on Psycho, Henri-Georges Clouzot's horror classic is the story of a sadistic headmaster who brutalizes his fragile wife and his headstrong mistress. The two women murder him and dump his body in a swimming pool; when the pool is drained, no corpse is found. Criterion presents Diabolique in a new digital transfer.

Customer Reviews:

Suspense plus. .......2007-09-09

There are countless reviews of this seminal film to be read on the internet, so I shall direct my focus away from the aspects with which most of them deal.

Consider, for example the backdrops. Have you noticed how detailed and intricate they are? Every cobblestone in a street is seen, every crease on a bedcover, every scratch on a door handle - every shot is crammed with detail. I cannot recall seeing a blank wall or a plain open space.

This richness of visual detail is usually missing in Hitchcock films. I also find a richer dialogue than Hitchcock at this period ever provided. Richer too is the cast of eccentrics, drunkards, neighbours, and bit players. The drunkard who attempts to secrete himself in the back of the van containing the body in the basket, once seen, is never forgotten.

Writers Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac wrote the novel and the film rights were obtained by Clouzot only hours before Hitchcock's bid was received. Never mind if Simone Signoret usually has a cigarette protruding from her mouth in the early scenes, never mind that she and Vera Clouzot are made to totter around on the absurdly high-heeled shoes women wore in the mid 1950s, this is a film that will look good and captivate audiences forever.

They say that breaking up is hard to dooeeewww. .......2007-08-07

The title for my review is from the 80's movie Better Off Dead when Lane Meyer gets dumped by his girlfriend and every song on the radio is a love song and while breaking up is hard to do is playing he tosses the radio out the window hence the doeeewwww, this is what Christina Delassalle should do and toss her mean abusive husband to the curb a long time ago. For any guy that has been rude or mean to his girlfriend and feels guilty this is necessary watching if you want to feel better about yourself.
The director H.G. Clouzot tries to out Hitchcock Hitchcock, I don't think he accomplishes that however he gets about as close as anyone could.
The acting is solid oscar winner Simone Signoret delivers a great performance as mistress Nicole Horner, another great film that she provides an amazing performance as well worth checking out is Army of Shadows - Criterion Collection.
In an Ebert review he quotes the famous story behind Diabolique A man wrote to Alfred Hitchcock: "Sir, After seeing `Diabolique,' my daughter was afraid to take a bath. Now she has seen your `Psycho' and is afraid to take a shower. What should I do with her?" Hitchcock replied: "Send her to the dry cleaners."
DVD
Criterion's transfer as always looks great and is presented in its original theatrical aspect ratio of 1. 33L1. This Digital Transfer was created from a 35mm Fine-Grain composite master, made from a restored negative.
No special features but some interesting info about the film provided in the film jacket.

Diabolique also ranks # 49th on Bravo's Scariest movie moments list.

Essential French cinema: Clouzot's 'Les Diaboliques.'.......2007-07-26

Considered by many critics as one of the 50 Scariest Movies ever made, and clearly among the most suspenseful films of the genre, Henri-Georges Clouzot's (1907-1977) Les Diaboliques (1954) is a black and white murder-mystery-thriller-classic about a brutish headmaster (Paul Meurisse) who bullies his fragile wife (Véra Clouzot) and his headstrong mistress (Simone Signoret). The two women conspire to murder the headmaster and then dump his body in a murky swimming pool; but when the pool is drained, no body is found. (As the end of the movie requests, I won't spoil the ending.) The film is based on the novel, Celle qui n'était plus, by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac, and is often compared to Alfred Hitchcock, who was reportedly also interested in the film rights.

Criterion presents Diabolique in an impeccable new digital transfer created from a 35mm fine-grain composite master, made from a restored negative.

G. Merritt

5 stars for film - but where is the english langage version?.......2007-07-20

Diabolique is a perfect combination of suspense, noire, detective work, and horror. Great story, acting - and an incredible final 10 minutes - on par with the original Haunting.

But I have one missgiving. There is a very well dubbed English version of this film - Which I own on VHS tape. I have seen both English and French versions - and I must say For a non-French-speaking-person - the English dub is superior. Reading subtltles in this horror film distances you from the film and kills off much of the suspence. The voices in the French version were looped as well - so there is really no high-brow advantage to seeing the film with subtitles.

Criterion's print is great as usual but disapointing without the English version - So - For me I will conintue to watch my old English dubbed VHS tape until someone comes out with a quality English version of this film on DVD. ( The english dub is so good it almost appears that english was the original language version - in that the voices are appropriate and fit wwell)

But either way - Diaboque is a great film.

Diabolique.......2007-06-25

Snatched from Alfred Hitchcock, who lost the film rights to Clouzot, "Diabolique" is one of the finest thrillers ever made--in any language. Macabre, mysterious, and haunting, it keeps you on the edge of your chair with mind-bending plot twists, taut pacing, and an atmosphere of ghostly uncertainty. Signoret is icy yet resplendent, while director Clouzot's real-life wife Véra conveys just the right mix of fear and paranoia. This is chilling perfection from a criminally under-recognized French master of suspense. Beware the atrocious American remake.

DVD:

DVD

DVD