"...one of the reasons I never remarried, despite a rather bewildering assortment of offers, was the determination NEVER AGAIN TO BE ORDERED AROUND!!!!....I must therefore ask that you take a less "marital" tone....." fantastic!!!!!
One of the reasons why I never remarried despite a quite bewildering range of offers is the determination never AGAIN to be ordered around! Greatest actress of all time.
Take note, she said that in a fast but utterly fluent line... The heiress to replace Peter O'Toole's record of a living actor or actress who has the most Oscar Nominations without a single win with 6....
Doesn't get much better than this. Script: magnificent. Acting: brilliant. Characters: completely believable and evoking such emotion from the audience. Hell, yeah.
Well that's cause its based on simply the best epistolary book of all times. It beats Voltaire's epistolary book for god's sake. This movie is good only because it is a fraction as good as the book its inspired off of.
They both were on the verge of tears. His lips quivered in other scenes, she showed such rage, cold anger and control. My God both actors were pushing the limits of their talents and no Oscar for her, incredibly unbelievable.
Tbh. It is just a quip. Because it's simply not true. The best swimmers swim. The worst, sink and drown. Or perhaps she means that when a ship is sinking; it's the swimmers who get dragged down by the ones who can't swim.
roddo I always took it as the best swimmers always try to go to dangerous places and that’s how they die . They’re convinced they can make a dangerous swim because they’re the best
Glen plays the consequences of a seductive counterparts of his desires. But she lets love be the enterprise... Is an amazing scene; "vanity and happiness"
+Tripti Thakur Well said. To me, the two biggest Best Actress Oscar blunders ever are Ellen Burstyn's role in Requiem For A Dream, and Glenn here. And that she lost to Cher the year before, who was only okay in Moonstruck.
lanvin1982 & somehow they both lost the oscar to Jodie Foster. it's ridiculous. & Foster has 2 oscars & Meryl has 3. Glenn has just disrespect from the Academy.
The evil is there no question but what moves me about that scene is Glenn Close's eyes and that tear that never quite falls down. That somehow is what makes that moment so human.
I love how this scene shows The vulnerable side of Valmont: he is, for the first time in the film, disheveled and unkempt. Not to mention (it's hard to see in this version) when the Marquise tells him that he is still in love with Tourvel, you can see he is crying: tears falling down his face, lip quivering. It's the first time (maybe other than the bed scene with Tourvel) that he shows his true feelings. Brilliant acting from Malkovich.
King Of Scotland Only a person that picks out grammatical inconsistency’s is the one that is in fear of their intellect. I know this because I was one. I bet I can even predict what you are doing now, scanning my paragraph for any. I left a certain number of them. I know the number, tell me, you can’t help it.. Sorry sap
King Of Scotland btw maybe word porn would help. Carl Sagan would be horrified at you trying to belittle somebody. Know how I know? I’m a Cornell Alumni and he is my Cousin and as a little boy at many Passovers I listened to him talk to my father redundancy and all. Know why? Because the few intellectuals we have in this world or had ( more Grammer mistakes for you) don’t think of themselves as that, just as real tough guys or gals don’t think they are tough and don’t go around beating up on people physically or intellectually.. What happened to you in your life? Bright but struggled academically? Or just stupid
I'm french and i'm totally in love with Choderlos de Laclos' novel but that movie is just epic... And Glenn Glose is incredible, her voice, her face... everything !
@@lepetitchat123 It is. And they made a superb french version, inspired by the book, which is of course very close to the language and expressions used back then.
Looks and charm are relative. The point of Malkovich's Valmont is he could be charming when it suited him. His ability to turn charm off and on at a whim was what made him also dangerous. As for looks, life and history have proven that women do not always go for the best looking man. Power is also sexy.
Ugh I gotta say 8 years later, so true I didn’t find Malkovich appealing at the beginning but his complexity and powerful charisma have won me over around the halfway mark
My daughter and I were talking about actresses who don't have any Academy Award; my first thought was Glenn Close! She is such an amazing actress! She deserves to be honor with the prize and fortunately she is running this year to be her work recognized.
It's so sad, watching Valmont in this scene watching him realise how much he'd lost and all for the sake of this woman's maliciousness and his own vanity.
Lifeisshort214 Meh, he’s as evil as her. But somehow that’s more excusable for a man. In the book he didn’t really love Tourvel but they had to make him a victim to Mertuil because oh burn the witch.
@@Selenite11 Oh I wouldn't disagree that he's as bad as Mertuil, if not worse because he is a man. He had everything and choose to spend his intelligence, power and privilege hurting others. Mertuil is woman is an intelligent and ambitious who had a limited number of paths open to her in terms of how she could amass power. Doesn't excuse her, but it is more understandable to me. Still I stand by my earlier statement that there is tragedy in the fact that Valmont in the movie at least, quite accidently found actual happiness, and then destroyed it because of his vanity and Mertuil's ability to use it against him.
"Remember I'm better at this than you are." "Yes well it is always the best swimmers who drown now... yes or no. It's up to you of course I will merely confine myself to a marking that a no will be regarded as a declaration of war. A single word is all that's required. "Alright...war." The way she enunciated the term "war" gave me chills it carried such meaning when she said it. Brilliant scene!
A minute and a half in and she already knows she won. He knew it too. Another minute later and she nearly loses her cool. Then she's on the verge of tears when she knows she lost him too. Then her pride of vanity wouldn't allow her to stop. I wish they had a behind the scenes or rehearsal footage of this. Like it's already been said, a masterclass in acting in under 5 minutes. WAR!
I read the book in my youth when I studied French literature at university. It is a true masterpiece of the French literature from the 18th century written by Choderlos de Laclos. The movie completely reflects the intense evil atmosphere conveyed by the novel through Mme de Merteuil's dark soul. Glenn Close was at her top then.
Glenn is in an acting league of her own. This scene & the one in Hamlet where her and Mel Gibson are on the bed and he is confronting his mother about the death of his father - are the two single best-acted scenes I've ever seen in my life. Like, wowzers!!!
I relate to so much of what critics say about Malkovich being miscast in this film, but draw a different conclusion; yes, he does not affect period mannerisms; yes, he, from the very first big scene '...I became a virtuoso of deceit...' looks just a little out of his depth, deeply, almost metaphysically uneasy, like he's been...well, miscast. Yes, he frequently sounds less invested in a scene than just annoyed with it. All of this serves the film and the character, rather than detract from it. It's an edgy casting choice that paid off brilliantly. Malkovich's Valmont is a man past his prime who is his own worst enemy. His sex-rogue guise used to work for him, but it already is starting to fray at the edges; he is comfortable and competent in Merteuil's drawing room or in Cecile's bed, but he's been deceiving and getting laid and trading barbs for maybe 20 years. His game isn't working for him anymore, on a gnawing, even spiritual level. Whereas he is SURROUNDED by sincerity - Cecile's youthful naivete, Merteuil's carefully-constructed evil and deep self-acceptance, Keanu's flat youthful idiocy, Pfeiffer's barely guarded passionate nature and deep capacity for genuine devotion and love......in the midst of all this swirling melodrama of sincere people who know what they're doing and why they're doing it for the most part, who when the are forced to pivot respond with genuine passion and LIFE......there's HIM, just leering and scheming half-heartedly at the center of it all. Laconic, depressed, despairing, from his first scene to his last. It's the PERFECT arrangement of personalities, and his contrast in every scene climaxes with the Duel, where his contempt for his own life is what primarily comes across. A livelier, 'wittier' more conventionally seductive Valmont might have satisfied some fans of period Romance, but this film ain't romantic. If you think that, with a slightly different turn of events, Valmont and Tourvel could have lived happily ever after, you saw a very different movie from me. Valmont was not ready to move in and be a devoted husband. He wasn't ready for love. I love Pfeiffer's line-reading of 'ENOUGH' right before she dies. Really, she's just had enough. He's full of s--t, and he knows it, and she knows it, and the fact that he has the dim, limited insight that he loved her and is nothing without her is a tiny step in a journey that he was destined, at this point in his life, never to take. His death is inevitable and appropriate to who he was. I can't imagine another actor capturing this as well. In this scene, all of this is present for me, in his complex emotions around his demand that the bargain be fulfilled. He barely wants to sleep with Merteuil. He barely wants to be alive.
Very well said. And there we have the world weariness of Stephen Freaers' interpretation of the material described very well. Malkovich's performance is key to that interpretation.
I LOVE how she barely even acknowledges him slapping her. She is everything you don't normally see in women in media - cold, calculating, strong, independent. Probably and example of how men and women ARE equal. She deserved an Oscar.
@@Selenite11 They are both malignant codependant narcs. Valmont was not in love with Mme Tourvelle, she was a conquest. And when he knew he had been beaten, he was willing to die at the hands of Danceny. The ultimate humiliation and revenge.
Omg I just realized how important their colors of their costumes are: Merteuil in white, pretending to be the victim and the victor as well as thinking herself above the Vicomte, while the Vicomte is in black- in mourning and despair and does not hesitate to reveal who he truly is any longer. The black can also symbolize his impending death, as well as Merteuil’s symbolic one.
This scene, which I have seen many times, is one from that incredible film that made me read the book which is so wonderful that you could, once you have completed it, open anywhere and find it traps you and you cannot put it down. This is one of the truly great films made for thinking grown-ups.
Why the hell doesn't she have an Oscar. Even one. She deserved more than one. But she doesn't have even one. Even Jennifer Lawrence does for God's sake. Glenn Close is Meryl Streep's equal for me. Academy just shows some artists favor. It has been like that all this time. They mostly made political decisions. They haven't awarded actors or films that deserved.
Keanu Reeves was, as usual miscast, but the rest of the troupe, including Swoozie Kurtz and Mildred Natwick were of high calibre But John and Glenn were exceptional!!!
Just wow wow wow, Close and Malkovitch at the top of their art, their acting gives so much depth to the characters, even though we would call these characters psychopaths, narcs, or energy vampires in real life.
When the book Dangerous Liaisons was published in 1782, it was so scandalous that when Queen Marie-Antoinette requested a copy for her library, it had to be bound in black so that no one knew what it was. Ironically, the image that the book and this film paints of the upper classes of French society had more than a passing impact on opinions that would help inspire the later French Revolution.
If you think about it, every bad thing that happened to Merteuil afterwards was all her fault. She and Valmont were playing a game. A game with rules. Challenges, rewards, flirts, seductions, sex, deceptions. All of it was part of their game, with each player trying to defeat the other, defeating meaning here asserting dominance. When she promised herself to him as a reward for seducing Madame de Tourvel, it was still part of the game. When Valmont was able to seduce her, he came very close to scoring, and maybe even securing victory. But in the meantime, he did fall in love with Tourvel, turning away from the game. Merteuil litterally forced him back into the game by tricking him into leaving her. It broke his heart, but he actually did leave her. He did for the game's sake. By breaking him that way, she was able to score herself, asserting dominance over him. However, he had still done everything she had asked of him, no matter how much it costed him. So basically, he had scored too. He could legitimately demand that she gave him his price. That's how the game works. However, that would mean that he would be back on equal ground with her, and she simply couldn't accept it. So she refused herself to him, this time without reason. She basically called off the game in order to be the winner. It's like saying "I'm winning, so the game is over". Only thing is, it was "merely" a game. With rules. But when we're talking war, there are no more rules. Anything's on. And Merteuil failed to consider that maybe she wasn't as good a warrior as she was a player. Everything could have turned out fine for her, but in sheer arrogance, she would rather fight a war than keep playing the game. Didn't turn out that fine.
Except if she slept with him knowing what state Valmont was in and his need to sate his own ego he probably would have destroyed the marquis's reputation. she would of been the ultimate conquest she had so much more to lose than him, its why she ever slept with him despite how badly the marquis wanted too. It wasn't a simple matter of giving Valmont what he wanted she had way too much to lose.
This is an old comment, but I can't agree. Mertueil and Valmont are both grown, both culpable... and both lost. This was because they both fell in love during this game, and instead of opting out, they let their pride get in the way. Sometimes the best way to win the game is not to play it. Meurteil broke Valmont's heart because she couldn't let him be happy with someone else. Valmont broke Tourvel's heart because of nothing more than pride. Through love, they were given a pretty decent out, and they both refused to take it. Now Valmont's dead, and Mertueil's disgraced. BTW, I don't feel bad for Valmont that Merteuil refused him. Who the hell potentially gives up a lifetime of love, just to fight to have sex with someone they don't even like anymore? Who is that bored?
She wrote her own downfall, those letters she wrote to Valmont sealed her fate, they were the final nails in her coffin and before she knew it all of Paris read the letters and well… that was it. She’s alone in the end, nobody wins at the end man. They were all destroyed.
@@thegreatestman851 In the book, she also developed a scarred face and a blind eye due to smallpox. On top of losing Valmont, Merteuil loses her beauty.
You are joking?? Colin Firth is wonderful in many of his roles, but John Malkovich IS Valmont. Colin's Valmont was too 'nice'... and Valmont was not a nice man. John Malkovich was perfect in this role, as was Glenn Close as Merteuil.
This movie is simply epic a real masterpiece, everytime that i watch it again it's like the first time, amazing. The cast was simply perfect IMO and did greatly!
"How wonderful of you" is the best line in this scene - at the beginning. She knows in that instant that she's won, and has made complete her lifelong purpose of defeating a man. Brava!
she did not defeat a man, she has deafened countless men in her lifetime. She is simply in love with this one and attempts to woo him in the most conniving way possible.
See the context of this tightly controlled time. What Merteuil and Valmont are threatening each other with is exposure. Both had their genuine natures revealed in an age where keeping up appearances was paramount, and both were destroyed, one literally, the other societally.
I'm so utterly stunned that this great actress did not win the Oscar for this part.Mrs. Close was perfection in every way. To use Bette Midler words. "I WAS ROBBED ( THE ROSE)'. Glen Close was robbed.
John Malkovich, despite not having conventional good looks, so embodies the elegant swagger of the 18th century libertine aristocrat that he radiates charisma and convinces us that he is an irresistible seducer. His elegant self-assurance, charm, and graceful, masculine bearing made viewers agree that for this film, he was spellbindingly attractive and sexy. (In many other films he came close to being type-cast as a creepy psycho.) The man is such a versatile and intellectual actor!
The movie is about two people who are frightened to love someone honesty and instead feel the need to dominate and control everything. Including each other, ultimately.
It does me too. It's brilliant how Glenn Close lets us know just how exciting she finds this battle of wills before she lowers the boom. She's absolutely breathtaking.
This is high camp. Stage acting on screen. Love it! Oh how I wish to see this movie again. One more time. Just delicious to watch Edit: It was on the BBC the other day and I missed the first half! I guess I'll just have to buy it.
John Malkovich should have won an Oscar for his performance In the line of fire and Glenn Close should have won an Oscar for her performance in Fatal Attraction!
Still one of my favorite movies ever…coming from someone who saw it when it came out and many times since and someone who really loves movies. There aren’t many movies with such great acting, a wonderful script, great music…Glenn Close deserved an Oscar for this performance and so did Malkovich. I can’t believe that she doesn’t have an Oscar.
At 4:42 she definitely seals her fate, that joyful smug look she had in almost the entire movie changes to A dark sorrow frail glance in the end. What you see is what you get.
I watched this movie when I was very young and I can honestly say it's impacted my life ! It's a masterpiece ! The way they both lose in the end is so hard breaking !
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
"So if you please, use a less 'marital' tone of voice"
Classic line from a legendary actress.
"...one of the reasons I never remarried, despite a rather bewildering assortment of offers, was the determination NEVER AGAIN TO BE ORDERED AROUND!!!!....I must therefore ask that you take a less "marital" tone....." fantastic!!!!!
A master class in acting in less than 5 minutes.
Absolutely!
Glenn Close is God.
Yes. Both. Wow!
Michelle Pfeiffer was also incredible in this movie in an understated way.
On Glenn Close's part, yes.
"Vanity and happiness are incompatible"...100% goosebumps. An absolute landmark movie.
One of the reasons why I never remarried despite a quite bewildering range of offers is the determination never AGAIN to be ordered around! Greatest actress of all time.
Exactly. No one even comes CLOSE.
👍🏼
Take note, she said that in a fast but utterly fluent line... The heiress to replace Peter O'Toole's record of a living actor or actress who has the most Oscar Nominations without a single win with 6....
@@cleverallan Make it 7. The Academy is a big fat joke.
@@victorcoutinho156 It's up to 8 now. Unbelievable.
Doesn't get much better than this. Script: magnificent. Acting: brilliant. Characters: completely believable and evoking such emotion from the audience. Hell, yeah.
Well that's cause its based on simply the best epistolary book of all times. It beats Voltaire's epistolary book for god's sake. This movie is good only because it is a fraction as good as the book its inspired off of.
CHRISTOPHER HAMPTON, RIGHT ?
Music and costumes are pitch perfect too
They both were on the verge of tears. His lips quivered in other scenes, she showed such rage, cold anger and control. My God both actors were pushing the limits of their talents and no Oscar for her, incredibly unbelievable.
I'm still not over Glenn Close not getting an Oscar for her performance. What a crime.
Spellbinding film. And what a riveting powerful scene !
An actress and actor at the peak of their powers. This scene is riveting.
Glenn Close has a sinister beauty that is incomparable.
"Remember, I'm better at this than you are."
"Perhaps, but it is always the best swimmers who drown."
What a fabulous line!
You are absolutely right.
Tbh. It is just a quip. Because it's simply not true. The best swimmers swim. The worst, sink and drown. Or perhaps she means that when a ship is sinking; it's the swimmers who get dragged down by the ones who can't swim.
roddo I always took it as the best swimmers always try to go to dangerous places and that’s how they die . They’re convinced they can make a dangerous swim because they’re the best
@@GullibleTarget this comment is so unbelievably stupid.
@@GullibleTarget You hilariously missed the point lol
Even though Glenn was so evil and calculating in this, I was rooting for her all throughout.
Tripti Thakur Very true. This is an astute assessment.
Glen plays the consequences of a seductive counterparts of his desires. But she lets love be the enterprise... Is an amazing scene; "vanity and happiness"
+Tripti Thakur Well said. To me, the two biggest Best Actress Oscar blunders ever are Ellen Burstyn's role in Requiem For A Dream, and Glenn here. And that she lost to Cher the year before, who was only okay in Moonstruck.
UM YES? ME TOO?
Of course! She's a total badass
I always thought Glenn Close is like the evil version of Meryl Streep
In this movie she's better than Meryl Streep. I don't think she could deliver here. Glenn Close is unbeatable in this scene.
lanvin1982 & somehow they both lost the oscar to Jodie Foster. it's ridiculous. & Foster has 2 oscars & Meryl has 3. Glenn has just disrespect from the Academy.
Cormac Mac Mahon Ikr!!!!
I thought they were the same people just until now.
The evil is there no question but what moves me about that scene is Glenn Close's eyes and that tear that never quite falls down. That somehow is what makes that moment so human.
I love how this scene shows The vulnerable side of Valmont: he is, for the first time in the film, disheveled and unkempt. Not to mention (it's hard to see in this version) when the Marquise tells him that he is still in love with Tourvel, you can see he is crying: tears falling down his face, lip quivering. It's the first time (maybe other than the bed scene with Tourvel) that he shows his true feelings. Brilliant acting from Malkovich.
disheveled and unkempt are synonymous. It's redundancy in other words, a result of an attempt to sound intelligent.
King Of Scotland Only a person that picks out grammatical inconsistency’s is the one that is in fear of their intellect. I know this because I was one. I bet I can even predict what you are doing now, scanning my paragraph for any. I left a certain number of them. I know the number, tell me, you can’t help it.. Sorry sap
King Of Scotland btw maybe word porn would help. Carl Sagan would be horrified at you trying to belittle somebody. Know how I know? I’m a Cornell Alumni and he is my Cousin and as a little boy at many Passovers I listened to him talk to my father redundancy and all. Know why? Because the few intellectuals we have in this world or had ( more Grammer mistakes for you) don’t think of themselves as that, just as real tough guys or gals don’t think they are tough and don’t go around beating up on people physically or intellectually.. What happened to you in your life? Bright but struggled academically? Or just stupid
Bronxguygunhillrd Not really, don’t project. Some people just really love words and are annoyed by these mistakes.
@@nakdad OMG, that was beautiful.
she gave me chills when she said: WAR
Glen Close is such a brilliant Actress, amazing and this is a brilliant film.
"unless you prefer this, if memory serves, rather purgatorial sofa" lol
I'm french and i'm totally in love with Choderlos de Laclos' novel but that movie is just epic... And Glenn Glose is incredible, her voice, her face... everything !
as much as i lv the english author daphne du maurier's novel..Rebecca..
Is the film a faithful adaptation?
@@lepetitchat123 It is. And they made a superb french version, inspired by the book, which is of course very close to the language and expressions used back then.
His voice crack when talking about Tourvel. WOW JUST WOW. Stunning acting.
The cat and mouse game and the dialogue between Glenn Close and John Malcovitch makes this movie brilliant.
Looks and charm are relative. The point of Malkovich's Valmont is he could be charming when it suited him. His ability to turn charm off and on at a whim was what made him also dangerous. As for looks, life and history have proven that women do not always go for the best looking man. Power is also sexy.
Ugh I gotta say 8 years later, so true I didn’t find Malkovich appealing at the beginning but his complexity and powerful charisma have won me over around the halfway mark
Two absolutely spectacular performances in a spectacular scene.
Every scene that Glenn close was in concerning this particular movie screamed "Oscar".
Glenn Close definitely should have left the 61st Academy Awards with an Oscar. She was absolutely marvelous in this movie as was Malkovich :)
I love how it goes chillingly quiet for a minute and then Meretuil whispers “war.” You knew right then things aren’t going to end happily.
My daughter and I were talking about actresses who don't have any Academy Award; my first thought was Glenn Close! She is such an amazing actress! She deserves to be honor with the prize and fortunately she is running this year to be her work recognized.
It's so sad, watching Valmont in this scene watching him realise how much he'd lost and all for the sake of this woman's maliciousness and his own vanity.
Yes, so true!!
Most definitely
Lifeisshort214 Meh, he’s as evil as her. But somehow that’s more excusable for a man. In the book he didn’t really love Tourvel but they had to make him a victim to Mertuil because oh burn the witch.
@@Selenite11 Oh I wouldn't disagree that he's as bad as Mertuil, if not worse because he is a man. He had everything and choose to spend his intelligence, power and privilege hurting others. Mertuil is woman is an intelligent and ambitious who had a limited number of paths open to her in terms of how she could amass power. Doesn't excuse her, but it is more understandable to me. Still I stand by my earlier statement that there is tragedy in the fact that Valmont in the movie at least, quite accidently found actual happiness, and then destroyed it because of his vanity and Mertuil's ability to use it against him.
Yes! He Lost A Deep True L💙ve because of vanity and a worthless monster who betrayed him and destroyed a beautiful fragile woman💔
One of the best actress ever.
She's the best. She deserves every award.
"Remember I'm better at this than you are."
"Yes well it is always the best swimmers who drown now... yes or no. It's up to you of course I will merely confine myself to a marking that a no will be regarded as a declaration of war. A single word is all that's required.
"Alright...war."
The way she enunciated the term "war" gave me chills it carried such meaning when she said it. Brilliant scene!
A minute and a half in and she already knows she won. He knew it too. Another minute later and she nearly loses her cool. Then she's on the verge of tears when she knows she lost him too. Then her pride of vanity wouldn't allow her to stop. I wish they had a behind the scenes or rehearsal footage of this. Like it's already been said, a masterclass in acting in under 5 minutes. WAR!
I read the book in my youth when I studied French literature at university. It is a true masterpiece of the French literature from the 18th century written by Choderlos de Laclos. The movie completely reflects the intense evil atmosphere conveyed by the novel through Mme de Merteuil's dark soul. Glenn Close was at her top then.
God I love Malkovich! Even as old as he is, he's still sexy. It's his intensity on screen.
Yes, I totally agree!!
Glenn is in an acting league of her own. This scene & the one in Hamlet where her and Mel Gibson are on the bed and he is confronting his mother about the death of his father - are the two single best-acted scenes I've ever seen in my life. Like, wowzers!!!
I relate to so much of what critics say about Malkovich being miscast in this film, but draw a different conclusion; yes, he does not affect period mannerisms; yes, he, from the very first big scene '...I became a virtuoso of deceit...' looks just a little out of his depth, deeply, almost metaphysically uneasy, like he's been...well, miscast. Yes, he frequently sounds less invested in a scene than just annoyed with it.
All of this serves the film and the character, rather than detract from it. It's an edgy casting choice that paid off brilliantly.
Malkovich's Valmont is a man past his prime who is his own worst enemy. His sex-rogue guise used to work for him, but it already is starting to fray at the edges; he is comfortable and competent in Merteuil's drawing room or in Cecile's bed, but he's been deceiving and getting laid and trading barbs for maybe 20 years.
His game isn't working for him anymore, on a gnawing, even spiritual level. Whereas he is SURROUNDED by sincerity - Cecile's youthful naivete, Merteuil's carefully-constructed evil and deep self-acceptance, Keanu's flat youthful idiocy, Pfeiffer's barely guarded passionate nature and deep capacity for genuine devotion and love......in the midst of all this swirling melodrama of sincere people who know what they're doing and why they're doing it for the most part, who when the are forced to pivot respond with genuine passion and LIFE......there's HIM, just leering and scheming half-heartedly at the center of it all. Laconic, depressed, despairing, from his first scene to his last. It's the PERFECT arrangement of personalities, and his contrast in every scene climaxes with the Duel, where his contempt for his own life is what primarily comes across. A livelier, 'wittier' more conventionally seductive Valmont might have satisfied some fans of period Romance, but this film ain't romantic. If you think that, with a slightly different turn of events, Valmont and Tourvel could have lived happily ever after, you saw a very different movie from me. Valmont was not ready to move in and be a devoted husband. He wasn't ready for love. I love Pfeiffer's line-reading of 'ENOUGH' right before she dies. Really, she's just had enough. He's full of s--t, and he knows it, and she knows it, and the fact that he has the dim, limited insight that he loved her and is nothing without her is a tiny step in a journey that he was destined, at this point in his life, never to take. His death is inevitable and appropriate to who he was. I can't imagine another actor capturing this as well.
In this scene, all of this is present for me, in his complex emotions around his demand that the bargain be fulfilled. He barely wants to sleep with Merteuil. He barely wants to be alive.
One of the best parts of coming back to rewatch this scene is reading new insights into it and this one is particularly excellent.
Wow. Just Wow.
You've just blown me away with your brilliant insight and observations.
I bow to you and I thank you for this thrilling post.
What a great response and criticism! You should be reviewing movies.
Very well said. And there we have the world weariness of Stephen Freaers' interpretation of the material described very well. Malkovich's performance is key to that interpretation.
Thank you so much for your valuable insight and analysis of the scene. I appreciate this artwork more.
I LOVE how she barely even acknowledges him slapping her. She is everything you don't normally see in women in media - cold, calculating, strong, independent. Probably and example of how men and women ARE equal.
She deserved an Oscar.
She represents a sociopath in the movie.
Orsi Korponai she represents an intelligent woman
B MMF Marquise de Merteuil is without a doubt, 100% a sociopath.
Ελισάβετ Παπαδοπούλου And I suppose Valmont is just a charming bad boy.
@@Selenite11 They are both malignant codependant narcs. Valmont was not in love with Mme Tourvelle, she was a conquest. And when he knew he had been beaten, he was willing to die at the hands of Danceny. The ultimate humiliation and revenge.
The swordfight at the end had me stunned! Utterly stunned. I purchased this as soon as the DVD came out and watch it a couple of times yearly.
Classic.
"Vanity and Happiness are incompatible" what a line! °_°
"I'm better at this than you."
"Perhaps. But it is ALWAYS the best swimmers who drown."
This movie was off the rails! Soooo good!
Omg I just realized how important their colors of their costumes are: Merteuil in white, pretending to be the victim and the victor as well as thinking herself above the Vicomte, while the Vicomte is in black- in mourning and despair and does not hesitate to reveal who he truly is any longer. The black can also symbolize his impending death, as well as Merteuil’s symbolic one.
This scene, which I have seen many times, is one from that incredible film that made me read the book which is so wonderful that you could, once you have completed it, open anywhere and find it traps you and you cannot put it down. This is one of the truly great films made for thinking grown-ups.
Why the hell doesn't she have an Oscar. Even one. She deserved more than one. But she doesn't have even one. Even Jennifer Lawrence does for God's sake. Glenn Close is Meryl Streep's equal for me. Academy just shows some artists favor. It has been like that all this time. They mostly made political decisions. They haven't awarded actors or films that deserved.
One of the great films of my time. Perhaps the greatest performances by
John Malcovic
Glenn Close
Uma Thurman
Michelle Phifer
And Keanu Reeves
Keanu Reeves was, as usual miscast, but the rest of the troupe, including Swoozie Kurtz and Mildred Natwick were of high calibre But John and Glenn were exceptional!!!
@@rogerjoseph8522 Agreed 🤝
Honourable mentions for Michelle and Uma
Both very, very good
Perhaps elevated even higher their performances by the company they were keeping
man the acting was something else.
God, they were magnificent! Striking sparks off each other .
Just wow wow wow, Close and Malkovitch at the top of their art, their acting gives so much depth to the characters, even though we would call these characters psychopaths, narcs, or energy vampires in real life.
It is the most intense scene of Dangerous Liasons. Two scoundrels, eating their own souls in between.👿👿
Malkovich plays a snake so brilliantly.
When the book Dangerous Liaisons was published in 1782, it was so scandalous that when Queen Marie-Antoinette requested a copy for her library, it had to be bound in black so that no one knew what it was. Ironically, the image that the book and this film paints of the upper classes of French society had more than a passing impact on opinions that would help inspire the later French Revolution.
The book was actually quite successful and well liked, but some of the content was deemed rather scandalous
Glenn Close is everything.
If you think about it, every bad thing that happened to Merteuil afterwards was all her fault.
She and Valmont were playing a game. A game with rules. Challenges, rewards, flirts, seductions, sex, deceptions. All of it was part of their game, with each player trying to defeat the other, defeating meaning here asserting dominance. When she promised herself to him as a reward for seducing Madame de Tourvel, it was still part of the game. When Valmont was able to seduce her, he came very close to scoring, and maybe even securing victory. But in the meantime, he did fall in love with Tourvel, turning away from the game. Merteuil litterally forced him back into the game by tricking him into leaving her. It broke his heart, but he actually did leave her. He did for the game's sake. By breaking him that way, she was able to score herself, asserting dominance over him. However, he had still done everything she had asked of him, no matter how much it costed him. So basically, he had scored too. He could legitimately demand that she gave him his price. That's how the game works. However, that would mean that he would be back on equal ground with her, and she simply couldn't accept it. So she refused herself to him, this time without reason. She basically called off the game in order to be the winner. It's like saying "I'm winning, so the game is over". Only thing is, it was "merely" a game. With rules. But when we're talking war, there are no more rules. Anything's on. And Merteuil failed to consider that maybe she wasn't as good a warrior as she was a player. Everything could have turned out fine for her, but in sheer arrogance, she would rather fight a war than keep playing the game.
Didn't turn out that fine.
True, but also given his mood acting like a mad monster forcing her no sane woman will offer him something especially in bed
Except if she slept with him knowing what state Valmont was in and his need to sate his own ego he probably would have destroyed the marquis's reputation. she would of been the ultimate conquest she had so much more to lose than him, its why she ever slept with him despite how badly the marquis wanted too. It wasn't a simple matter of giving Valmont what he wanted she had way too much to lose.
This is an old comment, but I can't agree. Mertueil and Valmont are both grown, both culpable... and both lost. This was because they both fell in love during this game, and instead of opting out, they let their pride get in the way. Sometimes the best way to win the game is not to play it. Meurteil broke Valmont's heart because she couldn't let him be happy with someone else. Valmont broke Tourvel's heart because of nothing more than pride. Through love, they were given a pretty decent out, and they both refused to take it. Now Valmont's dead, and Mertueil's disgraced. BTW, I don't feel bad for Valmont that Merteuil refused him. Who the hell potentially gives up a lifetime of love, just to fight to have sex with someone they don't even like anymore? Who is that bored?
She wrote her own downfall, those letters she wrote to Valmont sealed her fate, they were the final nails in her coffin and before she knew it all of Paris read the letters and well… that was it. She’s alone in the end, nobody wins at the end man. They were all destroyed.
@@thegreatestman851 In the book, she also developed a scarred face and a blind eye due to smallpox. On top of losing Valmont, Merteuil loses her beauty.
You are joking?? Colin Firth is wonderful in many of his roles, but John Malkovich IS Valmont. Colin's Valmont was too 'nice'... and Valmont was not a nice man. John Malkovich was perfect in this role, as was Glenn Close as Merteuil.
Very true...I love John Malkovich!! He is the ultimate bad boy!!
Totally agree...Malkovich MADE the movie!
this is so good two masters at their craft. So great.
Her range of emotions is amazing and his goes without saying
Amazing acting and a fantastic movie.
This movie is simply epic a real masterpiece, everytime that i watch it again it's like the first time, amazing.
The cast was simply perfect IMO and did greatly!
"Unless you prefer this, if memory serves, rather purgatorial sofa." Makes me laugh so much.
despicables characters, and yet I LOVE them... It's beyond my control!
"How wonderful of you" is the best line in this scene - at the beginning. She knows in that instant that she's won, and has made complete her lifelong purpose of defeating a man. Brava!
Dan Lynch but she didn't win
she did not defeat a man, she has deafened countless men in her lifetime. She is simply in love with this one and attempts to woo him in the most conniving way possible.
"I practiced detachment." And boy, did she mean it.
I seriously love these actors...simply amazing.
See the context of this tightly controlled time. What Merteuil and Valmont are threatening each other with is exposure. Both had their genuine natures revealed in an age where keeping up appearances was paramount, and both were destroyed, one literally, the other societally.
I'm so utterly stunned that this great actress did not win the Oscar for this part.Mrs. Close was perfection in every way. To use Bette Midler words. "I WAS ROBBED ( THE ROSE)'. Glen Close was robbed.
John Malcovich is fabulous.....should have won an Oscar for this!
Perfect example about two narcissists and worse, they are fighting.
Her response to his rage (from 2:11 through to 2:22) gives me the chills. I really hope she finally wins an Oscar this year.
It's striking! She's a virtuoso of acting the way her character is a virtuoso of deceit.
Its very hard for me to satisfy my taste for acting after watching this film
This is what I call perfection in script form
She is absolutely amazing! Glenn Close is just breathtaking
I forgot how good this movie is. I need to see it again.
This movie and the great performances bring to mind Gide’s assessment of Dangerous Liasons “it was written by the devil.”
Cersei Lannister: " I choose violence."
Merteuil: " war."
Don't compare a master to an amateur
Yes!!!!
What a friggjn’ AWESOME scene, I love , still love this movie !
What wonderful actors, beautiful, talent, wonderful costumes, a masterpiece.
WAR gives me fucking life. Why is this not a cult movie with a Big Lebowski-style following?
Because there are many more "bros" than sophisticated people out there, methinks.
What are you talking about? Dangerous liaisons is a masterpiece, still popular both the novel and the movie.
John Malkovich, despite not having conventional good looks, so embodies the elegant swagger of the 18th century libertine aristocrat that he radiates charisma and convinces us that he is an irresistible seducer.
His elegant self-assurance, charm, and graceful, masculine bearing made viewers agree that for this film, he was spellbindingly attractive and sexy. (In many other films he came close to being type-cast as a creepy psycho.) The man is such a versatile and intellectual actor!
How was John Malkovich not nominated for this role? Especially this scene in particular
The movie is about two people who are frightened to love someone honesty and instead feel the need to dominate and control everything. Including each other, ultimately.
I don't think they are frightened to love honestly so much as frightened of being--and of being seen as--vulnerable to the ones they love.
Sarah Michelle Gellar ain't got nothing on Glenn Close. Glenn is fucking brilliant.
4:25 that grin though, sent chills down my spine.
It does me too. It's brilliant how Glenn Close lets us know just how exciting she finds this battle of wills before she lowers the boom. She's absolutely breathtaking.
Prior to the publication of "Angela's Ashes", Les Liaisons Dangereuses was the only novel to have a one-word chapter. "War"
This is high camp. Stage acting on screen. Love it! Oh how I wish to see this movie again. One more time. Just delicious to watch
Edit: It was on the BBC the other day and I missed the first half! I guess I'll just have to buy it.
bravo- never gets old - oooo i love this movie!
Such a good scene good script and Malkovich good actor
John Malkovich should have won an Oscar for his performance In the line of fire and Glenn Close should have won an Oscar for her performance in Fatal Attraction!
Still one of my favorite movies ever…coming from someone who saw it when it came out and many times since and someone who really loves movies. There aren’t many movies with such great acting, a wonderful script, great music…Glenn Close deserved an Oscar for this performance and so did Malkovich. I can’t believe that she doesn’t have an Oscar.
I keep coming back to this scene, its 4 minutes and 46 seconds of the most sublime acting you could ask for!
At 4:42 she definitely seals her fate, that joyful smug look she had in almost the entire movie changes to A dark sorrow frail glance in the end.
What you see is what you get.
It takes one word to bring down the elaborate structure of deceptions--War.
Thank you sir. A great film!
Thanks hannah. What an amazing performance!
Dani thanks .
Thanks Cuca and Dani.
Mitube and Cuca, Thanks for 1+.
WAR
so good! this scene is gold!
This scene is terrifying on so many levels! I have to watch this movie again. :-D
Glenn Close is spellbinding.
They like the scheming more than anything else, which makes them perfect for each other in a lot of ways. Pre-Chuck and Blair.
"Vanity and happiness are incompatible." Words to live by.
I love every line they utter!
This film is a twentieth century masterpiece and the Academy gave no aretha... (Respect)
The most well crafted "Declaration of War" that I have witness. Brava and Bravo to the actors in the scene.
Goose bumps ... to this day.
I watched this movie when I was very young and I can honestly say it's impacted my life ! It's a masterpiece ! The way they both lose in the end is so hard breaking !
Vanity and happiness are incompatible.
This scene is just... I have no words.