“Les
Diaboliques” is a rare beast indeed; there’s not a moment in it that has aged
in the slightest, and the in-no-hurry-to-give-us-a-clue-or-even-a-red-herring
pacing gives it a sense of the banal, provincial and thereby the completely
believable.
There’s
an almighty reversal in the final moments, which is impressive but could have
happened in any other arrangement of duplicities, long-buried lies and
cruel-as-hell acting-out.
It’s a
common-or-garden story of casual misogyny, sexual violence, greed and small-town
jealousies and frustrations in regional France; the cinematography and set
design give the proceedings the sense of a hall of mirrors or conjuring trick.
This is fuelled wonderfully by a heavy sauce both of libidinal revenge, (“if
only he could know it was me doing it…”) and crises of identity (“at least we
will know who he is”).
