''Criminal Lovers'' (French title: ''Les Amants criminels'') is a 1999

psychological thriller Psychological thriller is a genre combining the thriller and psychological fiction genres. It is commonly used to describe literature or films that deal with psychological narratives in a thriller or thrilling setting. In terms of context and co ...

and horror film by French director

François Ozon François Ozon (; born 15 November 1967) is a French film director and screenwriter. Ozon is considered one of the most important modern French filmmakers. His films are characterized by aesthetic beauty, sharp satirical humor and a free-wheeli ...

. In fact, it is modern retelling of

Hansel and Gretel "Hansel and Gretel" (; german: Hänsel und Gretel ) is a German fairy tale collected by the German Brothers Grimm and published in 1812 in ''Grimm's Fairy Tales'' (KHM 15). It is also known as Little Step Brother and Little Step Sister. Hansel ...

Plot

High school student Alice convinces her boyfriend and lover Luc to murder their classmate Saïd, with whom she was having an affair, and who, she claims, raped her. When they dispose of his body in the woods late one night, the couple get lost on their way back to their car and are taken in by a mysterious old hermit. Matters take a bizarre turn when the stranger locks the young lovers in his cellar with the dead body of Saïd and reveals that he plans to eat them. The stranger harnesses Luc and convinces him to have sex by allowing Luc and Alice to survive. After sharing the stranger's bed with him, Luc escapes from the forest without killing the hermit. When the couple emerges from the forest, they find the police near their car. The authorities have learned of their murder of Saïd, and arrest them and the hermit, apparently after Saïd's body is found. Luc gets arrested after getting caught in a bear trap, and Alice tries to run away but is eventually caught and killed by the police. In the final sequence, Luc, in vain, tries to stop the police, who are beating the forester. In despair and anguish, Luc is carried to the city in the police car.

Cast

Reception

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film has a rating of 67% based on 15 critics, with an

average rating In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7 ...

of 6.1/10. On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, the film has a score of 59 out of 100 based on reviews from 13 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Neil Smith of

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

called the film "unsettling, subversive thriller that combines sadism, cannibalism, and homoeroticism to increasingly delirious effect".

Owen Gleiberman Owen Gleiberman (born February 24, 1959) is an American film critic who has been chief film critic for ''Variety'' magazine since May 2016, a title he shares with . Previously, Gleiberman wrote for ''Entertainment Weekly'' from 1990 until 2014. ...

of ''

Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cul ...

'' compared it to ''

Deliverance ''Deliverance'' is a 1972 American survival thriller film produced and directed by John Boorman, and starring Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty, and Ronny Cox, with the latter two making their feature film debuts. The screenplay was adapted ...

'' and

fairy tale.

Elvis Mitchell Elvis Mitchell (born December 6, 1958) is an American film critic, host of the public radio show ''The Treatment'', and visiting lecturer at Harvard University. He has served as a film critic for the ''Fort Worth Star-Telegram'', the ''LA Weekly ...

of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' had criticized the film, writing that "it never develops a life of its own" because of " tsamalgam of fairy tales, old movies and tabloid stories".

References

External links

* 1990s psychological thriller films Films directed by François Ozon French LGBT-related films French psychological thriller films LGBT-related thriller films 1999 LGBT-related films 1990s French films Films produced by Olivier Delbosc 1990s French-language films {{Psychological-thriller-film-stub