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Dangerous Liaisons Customer Reviews (7 - 9 of 28 Reviews)

Exceptional and thought provoking.
I love period dramas, and this movie is one of my favorites. The costumes, as well as the locations where they shot this film are very accurate and well done. The cast is exceptional, and the script is very well written.

Some of the scenes, with their rich dialog, blow me away, especially the scenes between Valmont (John Malkovich) and the Marquis (Glen Close). The characters in this movie are deep, complicated human beings. John Malkovich and Glen Close give an outstanding performance.

My two favorite parts in this movie are the opening scene and the final scene. In the opening scene, the Marquise de Merteuil (Glen Close) brushes her hair in the mirror and smiles to herself, as she sees her reflection. The final scene is of the Marquise taking off her makeup and looking at her reflection in same mirror. This time there are tears running down her face. The Marquis tells Valmont that her desire is to "win or die," as she seaks personal revenge over a society that gave her no freedom as a woman in upper class 18th century France. If the opening scene is of the Marquis "winning", we can guess what this final scene is about.

This is a dramatic movie. However, this film concludes with a brillent scene which quietly and tragically ends the story. This final scene is subtle, and creates pity for a character who has been a villain through out the film.


Love for Malkovich
I won't rehash the whole plot, we all know the story. I'd give this version of Dangerous Liaisons more stars if could. I only have one thing to say. I'm tired of all those people who say that John Malkovich wasn't handsome enough to play Valmont. Justin Chang from California wrote that he "didn't completely buy Malkovich as the charming lady-killer" and that casting him in the role was a "a small but serious flaw that undermines the whole film". Bulls**t!

How could anyone watch Malkovich's stellar performance and think of nothing except looks. Hollywood is so full of "good-looking" actors and actresses who can't act their way out of a paper bag. In modern times we often value conventional beauty over all other aspects of a person's character. A lot of these Hollywood hunks wish they could act as well as Mr. Malkovich. Get over it, people, no one will ever play Valmont better!

Two Movies of the Same Story. One Clear Winner. Buy It!
The two movies, `Dangerous Liaisons' directed by Stephen Frears and `Valmont', directed by Milos Forman are a real anomoly in that they were released at almost exactly the same time and tell almost exactly the same story, based on an old novel, `Les Liaisons Dangeruese' by Choderlos de Laclos. It is a minor tragedy that `Valmont' received so much less attention and promotion than `Dangerous Laisons'. I suspect that had a lot to do with the fact that `Valmont' was released by the company Orion which may have been in its last throes of survival and simply did not have the means to promote the film.

The only bright side of this situation is that the `Dangerous Liaisons' implementation of this story is much better. It is a sign of the value of `...Liaisons' that it is much better than a really worthy movie.

I believe the difference in the quality of the two movies lies directly on the aptness of the casting and the quality of the acting. On all the lesser qualities which go into making a movie such as set decoration, cinematography, editing, music and the like, the two films are easily on equal terms.

The heart of the matter is in the comparison of `...Liaisons' casting of Glenn Close and John Malkovich in the principle roles versus `Valmont's casting Colin Firth and Annette Bening. While Firth is physically much more believable as a Casanova type, Close and Malkovich are far superior than Bening and Firth at playing world class scoundrels. At the secondary level, `...Liaisons' casting of Uma Thurmen and Keanu Reeves as the two young innocent lovers is immensely more satisfying than the `Valmont casting of unknowns Fairuza Balk and Henry Jones. My memory of their relative careers is a bit dim, but this movie is ample evidence of why Uma and Keanu are big stars today and Fairuza and Henry are footnotes to cinema history.

Of the fifth major role, we have `...Liaisons' casting Michelle Pfeiffer versus `Valmont's casting Meg Tilly. This may be the only role where the two movies are close. Tilly gives a great performance as a naïve young wife who ultimately gives into Valmont's seductions, but I think Pfeiffer is even better. Here, the difference may have been in the writing, as I suspect Pfeiffer's role is just a bit more strongly written, so Michele had more to work with.

If nothing else convinces you, compare the seduction scenes between Malkovich and Thurmen versus Firth and Balk and the mix of sweetness with darkness in the former versus the pure soft core porn of the latter will carry the day.

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