Belle de jour (1967)

Director Luis Buñuel's first film in color, Belle de Jour also kicked off the last phase of his great career, which produced some of his most popular films (The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, That Obscure Object of Desire). Catherine Deneuve serves Buñuel here as Grace Kelly did Alfred Hitchcock, as the glacially beautiful blonde who is barely concealing smoldering desires. Séverine, Deneuve's character, finds that marriage is not the beginning of contentment, but a key which unlocks the doors of her abusive past to allow her imagination to run unfettered. How many of the film's events are "real" is left up to the viewer; Buñuel clearly wants to blur the distinctions between Séverine's erotic dreams and her attempts to fulfill them. A lesser filmmaker would wallow in the prurience of the story of a sexually frustrated wife turning to prostitution; for Buñuel, however, making films about sex is about exploring much more than human desire and physical contact. What makes his approach unique is its playfulness; he can have it both ways, provoking the audience one moment and winking the next, as if to say, "This thing we call life, it's a big joke, isn't it?" ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide