Catherine Deneuve (Belle de Jour [1967])
Belle de jour is a 1967 French film starring Catherine Deneuve as a woman who decides to spend her days as a prostitute while her husband is at work. The title is the French name of the daylily (literally: "beauty of the day"), a flower that blooms only during the day, although the name almost certainly is also an ironic reference to "belle-de-nuit" (literally, beauty of the night, lady of the night), a French term for prostitute. The film was directed by the Spanish director Luis Buñuel, based on the 1928 novel of the same name by Joseph Kessel. Buñuel is known as a surrealist. All of his films deal with dream and fantasy in some way. In Belle de Jour the two most crucial themes are morality and sexuality.
Discuss how the lead character's inner demons poke up through every-day malaise.
What are some ways that the lead character escapes into fantasies? Describe at least one scene from the film.
Do you think this film has a moral?
Do you find yourself identifying with Severine for betraying her husband and the social norm.
Give your opinion.
17 comments:
It looked like in Severine's everyday life, she was frequently reminded of the life with her father. In my opinion, it looked like she was sexually abused by her father. The memories of her relationship with her father kept coming back to her in everyday situations.
Severine escape's in her everyday life into a fanatasy world. She gazes and falls into this sexual fantasy world. She frequently fanatasies about her relationship with her husband Pierre and him finding out that she is renting her body out. He then remprimands her by physical abuse. Even when she is in the brothel, she fantasies about life with others.
One scene from the movie, is when she has met the Duke at a outside cafe. They meet each other and decide for Severine to come back to the Duke's house. They take a long carriage ride to the Duke's house. He makes her dress in this black veil and nothing else and act as if she is dead. Once that is over, she is getting dressed and the butler throws her out.
I believe the movie gives a question to viewers, does Severine have moral issues with selling her body? Is that the wrong thing to do? Is it justified because she is bored at home?
I don't think I identify with Severine breaking the norm and acting out and joining a brothel. Her insecurity or lack of something with her marriage is making her betray her husband and join the brothel. She is looking for that one thing that is missing from her relationship and tries to go find it in the other meaningless relationships.
I am confused at the end of the film when the husband gets up out of the wheelchair and walks up to Severine and asks her about vacation. Was he really hurt or shot? I am confused. - Pattie P
>Severine had constant flashbacks to her childhood throughout the movie. It was kind of hard to follow but it seemed like she was abused as a little girl.
>Severine would daydream, it seems, during the dullest part of her day to day routine.
>The first scene when she was being whipped, but it turned out to be a dream. When you look at the dream then at where she is socially, in the world. I think that she feels like she is worthless. I did not see the whipping as some sexual escape, but more like she was getting what she felt she deserved. That kind of emotion could have either come from her childhood or her building guilt from cheating on her husband.
>I'm not sure if there is a moral because I did not fully understand the ending of the movie. The one moral I could say would be to be thankful for what you have.
>I did not identify at all with Severine's character. I think she was a gold-digging coward. I think she liked the financial security she had with her husband and that is why she did not fully follow through with her true feelings. If she was that un happy, but unwilling to follow her heart she was either too cowardly to leave her husband or was simply with him for the money. -Triston Thomas
It seemed like the main character, Severine, had inner demons that would come out in flashbacks throughout the day bringing back memories that lead us to think that her dad or step-dad molested her when she was a child.
She would day dream sometimes that she was being abused somehow by her husband and people she knew, which shows that her “perfect” life was not satisfying her. The dreams or fantasies would be employees taking advantage of her with her husband’s approval, or her husband and a friend throwing mud at her while she was tied up to a pole. Maybe the mud could be a symbolic way to show that she felt dirty and unworthy of her husband’s pure love.
Due to the fact that a “perfect” life did not satisfy her, shows that not everybody needs to have that type of life- married with a good husband- to be happy. There is more to life than that pattern adopted by society.
I think that anybody can identify him or herself with Severine somehow. Everybody some how tries to escape the social norms sometimes. I do not think that cheating on the husband or wife is the right way, maybe, one should not get married because it is not fair to the other person.
by TERENA RIBEIRO
Discuss how the lead character's inner demons poke up through every-day
malaise.
The daydreams, or fantasies are a large part of how her demons make
themselves a part of everyday life. The dream about the whipping and sexual
activity in the woods in the very beginning is one of the movie's stronger
examples of this.
What are some ways that the lead character escapes into fantasies? Describe
at least one scene from the film.
There are scenes woven throughout the movie that can be regarded as either fantasties or warnings. Such as the scene when as a girl she refuses to take communion from the Priest, or the scene when she is being covered in manure. Obviously representative of what she feels she is doing to herself.
Do you think this film has a moral?
What I took from it was that their is always a consequence for your actions,
often just as severe as the violation. In this case, Severine broke a serious
moral value and there were very serious repercussions.
Do you find yourself identifying with Severine for betraying her husband and
the social norm?
I do. I'm positive that there is a certain excitement that comes from being
reckless like she obviously was. But with the abandonment of with a moral
aspect of life comes a price. That price was unfortunately paid by her
husband.
-Brian Marshall
Going through her flashback of her thoughts is seems like she dealt with some sexually abuse with a family member. Her dealing with that its matter of time that she was headed down in that path. In her case she must have a lot of therapy and commitment with her body. When the man gave her the address she knew what was up, by her going to Madame Anais house all undercover. It all started when she went to the place the next day and when she had to come back at two to see how it went down over there. Belle de jour got hooked on it when she came back after that week she had left from there. She would escape to her fantasies only when she would get into something that she knew that was wrong. I think the movies have a moral to it especially for the woman and who ever got sexuality abused as a young child. I don’t think I could identify myself with her how she betray her husband. I doubt that the husband had any clue what she been through but she could of communicate with him of what she been through, instead of breaking the marriage vows.
I think that Severine’s demons poked up through her day dreams but I also sew it in her relationship. As her husband tried to get closer to her she would push him away but I think that was because he wasn’t rough enough for her or she wanted a little bet of a change so it seemed.
One of the obvious ways Severine escaped into her fantasies was at the whore house and in her daydreams but also through the young man that fell for her later in the movie. They both feed each others fantasies both acting for one another in their role playing games.
The scene that stuck with me was when Severine was caught. I can not remember the man name but I’m srue he was friends with the husband. He was trying to peruse Severine and he was only interested in her because she was a virgin. He would show extra kindness to her but when he found out about her other life he changed dramatically. He’s words where harsh and rude and he lost interest in her .
I think the film may have had a lot of moral and if I sew it again I would probably find a better one but all I really sew was that the husband didn’t deserve to be cheated on. So your actions control more then just you.
I don’t identify with her betrayal because I believe in karma but I do understand that she wanted more from him sexually. I understand that some people have there little kinks such as role playing and other things but I don’t think cheating was the answer. Even if she wanted more or to explore, he deserved to know how she was feeling before she started her other life but in those times such as sex games where probably not as excepted like it is know.
I believe that Séverine's enclosed lifestyle pushed her into wanting to make such a harsh decision. As a lonely and bored housewife, she felt the need to fulfill her erotic fantasies. I also felt that she and her husband were a bit distant, and didn't share an intimate relationship.
I believe that her decision to work as a prostitute was an escape from her reality, where she could satisfy her carnal desires.
A scene that still sticks with me from the movie was when she met her first client in the brothel, and was at first resistant to the man touching her. She seemed scared and unsure; this showed how insecure and conflicted she was feeling.
I do believe this film has its morals. Séverine was a young, rich, and beautiful woman. Her husband was a professional doctor who seemed to be earning good money. From that point of view her life seemed perfect, but under her mask lied a depressed woman with nightmares from the past that still hunted her. Things are never what they seem, and money, beauty and prosperity don't necessarily bring joy and happiness to our lives.
I think in some way I can relate with her character. We all have inner battles that we struggle with. We've all done things that are against another people's wills. We're human, nobody's perfect, we all sin, we all betray and we all lie.... at least that's what I believe. ^_^
I got a little confused in some scenes where I didn't know if they were memories from the past, if they were thoughts of her subconscious, or if they were real live events.
-Josué Franco
Graphic Design
Discuss how the lead character's inner demons poke up through every-day malaise.
The lead character Severine was first seen as a shy, quiet, and a conservative woman. The way Severine inner demons poke up is by her fantasizing about her sexual desires, even though her inner feeling are not expressed in real life. Severine and her husband Pierre marriage did not have amount of affection and love that is common in a loving relationship. They both slept in separate beds and always seemed to have some sort of distance from each other. Marriage is a union of two people. It is based on love, care, affection, and intimacy. Sex is an important part of the marriage. It is through marriage that sex is openly accepted in our society. If intimacy is absent from the marriage, then one or both of the partners suffer. Severine longed for this intimacy. Affection was absent from her everyday life. She longed for affection and she didn’t any in her husband. Hence her inner desires for being wanted and needed sprung up in a negative way.
What are some ways that the lead character escapes into fantasies? Describe at least one scene from the film.
Severine character escaping into fantasies was apparent throughout the whole film. We are revealed several scenes of her daydreaming that show her inner desires. One particular fantasy she had that really stood out in my mind was in the beginning of the film. We are shown a loving couple going through the woods on horse drawn carriage. Then we thrown for a loop when her husband snaps and starts yelling at her then tells to get out of the carriage, while she refuses he asks the help of two horse carriage drivers to pull his wife out of the carriage and drag out into the woods. The while deep into the woods she is beat with a whip. In the end her husband tells the two horse carriage drivers they can have their way with his wife, then one of the carriage drivers starts kissing her neck then she starts moaning in pleasure, then we are all of sudden showed reality and realize she was fantasying about being tortured and raped.
Do you think this film has a moral?
Belle de jour to me does not have any moral to the story. It seemed liked the film was based on inner desires of a young suburban woman. It had scenes that were very pointless and no true meaning.
Do you find yourself identifying with Severine for betraying her husband and the social norm?
I can not see myself identifying with Severine for deceiving her husband and the so-called social norms because I am against her actions.
It seems to me that Severine's "inner Demons" are simply her desires and passions that are not being satisfied by her husband. she has several dreams and later, sexual experiences of being dominated by other men to fulfill her desires. I see it almost like the typical attraction to a cultural figure like bikers or "bad boys". but, at a earlier time period where such sexual freedom had not yet been realized. I don't think this ties in to her morals, in the scene where her husbands friend visits the brothel, she refuses to pleasure him, while she earlier in the movie has dreams of him at the pig farm. the movie seems to be about sexual expression then about morals. it was made quite clear throughout the movie she always loved her husband very much, even after he could no longer move, from being shot.
Blair Kuchelema.
Severine seemed to try and cope with some inner demons that her life kept bringing up. As she went through certain things, she seemed to have recurring flashbacks to when she was a child, which seemed to make her feel worse. The flashbacks seemed to show some kind of abuse when she was a child.
Severine seems to fantasize a lot during the movie. She seems to slip in and out of fantasies throughout the movie, which makes them seem like reality. Severine has fantasies about Pierre finding out about her secret life of prostitution. In her fantasy, Pierre ends up taking her on a carriage ride out into the forest, having the carriage driver take her and tie her up and whip her and beat her as Pierre watched, having no pity on her.
I am not so sure that there was a moral to this story, as much as there was a question to be asked. The question is whether it is worth going against the norms just to get a taste of what you don’t have.
I do not identify at all with Severine. She would have been better off looking around at her life and seeing what a great life she already had instead of running away from her problems and creating new and bigger problems by doing so.
I thought the movie was good, except the ending of it lost me. I wasn’t sure if the movie was all a dream or if it was the reality of the character’s life. The last part confused me the most with her husband standing up out of the wheelchair and walking over to her and talking to her about a vacation trip. I just wasn’t sure if that was a dream or if it was reality.
Severine's inner demons seem to poke throw when she is bored or uninterested in whatever she is doing at the moment. People dream of having the perfect life where everything someone could possibly ask for is there for them at ease. My guess is that Severine had always gotten what she wanted and never suffered or had to of work for anything, so in turn she wanted something out of the ordinary.
It seemed that she had been that way as a child when she would listen to the priest. She then punished for her sins. When Serverine would go to the whore house, she liked being abused by her clients because she felt safe being punished. Her daydreams and nightmares where ways to forget or blind herself from the truth. In the scene where her husband was allowing his coworker to through mud at her was her inner feelings being covered. She felt dirty and violated, but enjoyed the punichment.
I kinda realate to Serverine because sexual desires are very strong and sometimes it may feel like it's hard to stay true, but htere is no excuse for cheating. If you want to have sex or other relationships with other people, tell your companion. Things can be worked out where your companion feels the same and you can have an open relationship, or you brake up. It would hurt allot less for both partners.
I think the movie could have a couple morals. Don't cheat on your companion or the costs could be great. Be happy with what you have, because you could have less. If your gonna cheat, do it in another zip code. I guess thats where that term came from. You won't run into your companions and coworkers if your in another zip code or state.
Gregory Smith II
Severines life seemed to be a mixure of her fantasy world and the real world around her. With flashbacks commonly occuring of what seemed like sexual abuse. It seemed to make it very difficult to let her live her life. she seemed to relate sex with abuse having outlandish fantasies about her husband pierre and many others treating her very badly while having there way with her.
she seemed to be just an extreme individual just hearing about a brothel inticed her and made her go check it out. selling her body to a wide variety of men seemed to finally fulfill her. Unfortanately her double life lead to her husband being shot a put into a comma.
But by the end her imagination seemed to take over again as see had a conversation with her husband which seemed to finally make her happy with her marrage.
-Will Hensley-
>Discuss how the lead character's inner demons poke up through every-day malaise.
To me, it seemed like Severine was dealing with supressed memories of sexual abuse through vivid taboo fantasies.
>What are some ways that the lead character escapes into fantasies? Describe at least one scene from the film.
She had joined a braffle at day hours. At the braffle she took on the name of daylily and submitted herself to that line of work by choice.
>Do you think this film has a moral?
The moral of the story is to avoid dangerous situations, or else they'll come back to bite you.
Do you find yourself identifying with Severine for betraying her husband and the social norm.
Give your opinion.
I can understand her point of view of needing to further her self-expression, however I am unable to relate to the term of betrayal and putting myself in harms way.
--Greg Allen
- Severine's life was filled with flashbacks of her abused past and abusive fantasies. Some examples are the child in the brothel, the abuse of her husband, the sexual acts, the lies, and the assault on her husband by another man.
- Severine used sex as a major escape into her fantasies. The rollplaying and mistreatment that came with selling her body was a major contributor. This was no less apparent in the scene where she played a corpse for the Duke and then was thrown out immediately after. She was treated as garbage, which was apparently what she thought of herself.
- I think the moral of the film could be argued, but, ultimately I beleive that it's about self-respect. Severine obviously has some serious phsychological and emotional issues that control her. She's incredibly attractive on the outside, but very ugly on the inside.
- I definitely don't identify with Severine's choices. It's completely fine with me if somebody wants to mistreat or abuse themselves, but when somebody else is being affected (her husband), then that's where I have a problem.
CONCLUSION: I'm a little confused about the ending. I translated it that she had fantasized about the entire story, and that none of it ever happened. Although, some of the "fantasies" were mixed with real life events that happened to her in the past.
I would say that Severine was definitely sexually abused during her childhood by a man; maybe her father. From psychology classes and documentaries that I have seen, many women who are sexually abused grow up being more promiscuous. A lot of times they have sex very young or need to re-experience the feeling of sadness and abuse. I think by being a prostitute this showed her inner demons coming out. She spaces off and either thought about her past, such as not taking communion; which I think is because she felt she didn’t deserve to receive it, because the sexual contacts she was being forced to have, made her feel impure. Also she daydreams about her husband throwing manure at her. She knows what she is doing is wrong but she has to do it. To me the moral from this film is to deal with inner demons because when you don’t and you keep reliving the pain and sinful ways of life you not only end up hurting yourself, but other people as well. I guess in a way I can identify with her in this movie because there is always a side to a person that wants to do the crazy things in life that aren’t correct. Now that I am older though, I try to think more about my actions and problems; because I know they all have consequences. In the end of the movie when her husband is paralyzed and she has to take care of him is really a huge consequence for her and him. Her actions pretty much took the life of the one she loved. To me that’s an even harsher punishment than taking her own life.
Brooke Wolken
Belle de Jour- A lot like pretty woman, sort of. My opinion of the movie, really weird. If you're bored because you're husband is working all the time, find something to do besides whoring around. As far as her fantasies, what can I say to that? A bit disturbing. But people find ways to escape the real world, and her fantasies obviously got her to escape.. Social norm? Hell no. Women these days are still prosituting, just to make money. The character of this movie, I'm guessing, does it out of boredom and pleasure? Disgusting to me. But people choose to do things, and they are left with the consequences. One of her pleasure-makers fell in love with her and had to have her, and out of this her husband dies. Typical.
-Tyra R.
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