esrosedotblog

Today's film owes a lot to Alfred Hitchcock including the slight taint of irrationality to the plot and the principals.

L'inconnu du lac / Stranger by the Lake ((2014)

Not to spoil anything about this Ebert **** film but when Michel goes to the beach and sees someone get drowned he does not run to the cops because, why? Afraid? Maybe. He is a gay man in a notorious cruise spot at a nude lake beach. And it is dark. And, and, and.

The pace of the film is very carefully calculated to stop the critical thinking. It also helps that not one of the male principles wears any clothing. Well, the cop. But he is nerdy skinny. And a straight man who sits and watches, an observer of the human scene. Obese. Everyone else is camera ready.

The sex is mostly explicit with full arousal. None of that cuddle up and pretend penetration. And yet there is nothing obscene about it. Like all good erotica, it has a punch. And in this case advances the story. At one point our hero, begging to realize he is consorting with a murderer loses his erection and is caught out at it. The beginning of the end for the two lovers.

The idea that danger, even extreme danger increases libido is not new. It might be disputable but it is real here in the film. When they are hot they are hot and when they are not, no.

This is a 5 out of Netflix5. Very well made except for a couple of mismatches of color correction from scene to scene. Hard to figure. A last minute edit that said "to hell with it". It isn't disturbing but it is distracting reminding us that, in my mother's assuring words to me as a mere child, "it is only a movie".