User Reviews

For a historical French film, this effort by Benoit Jacquot comes on target. The tragic figure that was the Marquis de Sade is given a very sympathetic view from the director and it helps that Daniel Auteuil is portraying the main character.

The screenplay based on the novel by Serge Bramly, by Jacques Fiesch shows us the days of the Reign of Terror in France and what happened to these royals are they are sent to the country estate because they all have fallen out with the revolutionary government for different reasons.

The Marquis de Sade would, by today's standards, have been an eccentric living among the high society of Paris without raising an eyebrow, but unfortunately, his life happened during that period of turmoil where he was singled out as evil for just questioning the values and the hypocrisy of the French aristocracy.

The portrayal of de Sade by Mr. Auteuil is very restrained and dignified in contrast with other accounts of the Marquis by other actors in other films. He is interested in Emilie de Lancris, who just happens to be in the same place with her parents. Isild Le Besco, the actress playing her, has an enigmatic kind of beauty. She wants to learn and chooses the Marquis to be her guide into an unknown world.

An ensemble cast was assembled for this film. Among the most the best: Jeanne Balber, as the naughty Madame Santero. Silvie Testud and Gregoire Colin in minor roles and the great Jean Pierre Cassel as Emilie's libertine father.

This has been one of the most underrated films that have come from France lately, and unfortunately, it only lasted not even 2 weeks at Manhattan's mecca for "arty" films, the Lincoln Plaza complex, where there were only about 6 people in the theatre when we saw it. Yet, the same theatre was full when the overrated Amelie played for months.

It is hard to rate a film about Marquis de Sade without being preoccupied in any way. For instance, compared to "Goya en Burdeos" this film performed much better in drawing a historical context for a historical character. But I would still expect more than that from a film about de Sade. Despite the very good acting, original sets and costumes, and a coherent script, there was something missing. De Sade's known main characteristic are his sexual notions, and those have been hidden in innuendos. It was an attempt to portray de Sade without showing sexual excesses, but you cannot discuss a controversial character without disclosing the reasons for the controversy. To those who are not familiar with de Sade, I would recommend reading a brief description of him in an encyclopedia before seeing the film.

'Sade' is based on the same thesis as 'Quills' (which was better) - in a period of revolution, leading from the decadent monarchy of Louis XVI through the bloody Revolution to the imperial demagogy of the Napoleon era, the legendary marquis de Sade was not a problematic libertine author, but rather an early symbol of freedom of speech. An 18th century Flint, if you want! Well, if you accept this angle, the two films can be judged as worth watching.

The French version is rather conventional, but well made and acted, in the style of the French historical cinema (the good one). You certainly can get confused, as you may not understand all the political nuances, which are certainly familiar to any French collegian, but you cannot be indifferent to the well played theme of expecting death, counting back the days and hours before the guilotine falls. Art ('Art'?) and Love ('Love'?) are victors over fear and death - this is the central message. Mass graves and fear are unfortunately still true in the 21th century as well. So is the permanent fight between freedom of expression and dictatorial puritanism.

The rithm of the film is rather slow, but acting is solid. 'Quills' was better, because it went even further with its central theme. However, 'Sade' is also worth watching. 7/10 on my personal scale.

This semi-biographical/semi-fictional account of the Marquis of de Sade (the great Daniel Autiel) is set during the "reign of terror" period of the French Revolution. The Jacobin revolutionaries had no idea what to do with Sade, who had been freed from the Bastile in 1789, but was also a symbol of the decadence of the noble class with his undisguised atheism, his sex crimes that had scandalized even the other decadent nobles, and above all his scandalous, decadent, and blasphemous plays and novels. So they put him into a "asylum"/prison on the estate of a hypocritical/opportunistic nobleman-doctor, along with a lot of other noble families hiding out from the terror (and paying financially for the privilege). There they reassert the old order, for instance, with wealthier noblemen taking liberty with the pretty young wives of poorer nobleman. Sade meanwhile tries to put on his scandalous plays under the aegis of the new regime and supposedly to preach AGAINST atheism. This movie covers roughly the same territory as "Marat/Sade" and "Quills", but drops any idea of Sade actually being insane. Here he is portrayed as quite sane--and even heroic--in comparison to the hypocrites surrounding him.

This particular movie focuses less on his work though and more on two fictionalized (if not entirely fictional) subplots. One involves Sade's manipulation of the mother of his child, who is now the mistress of a high-ranking Jacobin, "Fournier", who she in turn manipulates to save Sade from the guillotine. "Fournier" is a sympathetic character, a child of the revolution who is doomed to be eaten by it, and Sade indirectly but skillfully manipulates him like a character in his one of his plays.

The perhaps more interesting and certainly more sexy story involves Sade befriending the young daughter of a rich nobleman (Isild LeBesco), who he seems to simultaneously be sexually debauching for his own amusement while also saving her from the guillotine by getting her pregnant by other men (of lowlier social stations, of course). 17-year-old LeBesco is absolutely incredibly here. First off, is her truly unique looks--she is pale and blue-eyed, but actually part Asian, and is capable of looking both "ugly" and very beautiful. Second, is her voluptuous body which is just unambiguously beautiful (and not surprisingly, she shows it off a lot in her movies). Most significantly though is her ACTING. She goes toe-toe with Auteil as a precocious young girl who is intellectually Sade's equal, but still a virgin naïf in sexual matters. Her "deflowering" scene is absolutely incredible as once again Sade conducts a near-orgy like it's one of his plays.

This probably isn't the most historically accurate account of the Marquis De Sade (having read of the truly appalling "120 Days of Sodom", I have trouble believing the real guy was this moral and NOT in some sense insane). But it's a very enjoyable movie.

I saw this on Cinemoi, the satellite French movie channel.

Some of us are familiar with the famous story of the notorious French aristocrat, imprisoned, in some comfort at a Château during the French Revolution. Familiar on both sides of the English Channel now, Daniel Auteille stars as the lecherous libertine and Marianne Dennicourt as the young girl, daughter of another imprisoned noble family who becomes secretly fascinated by him.

Those that have read/seen other versions - the only one I have is Philip Kaufmann's "Quills", a Hollywood-tinged softly erotic character piece for both Geoffrey Rush and Kate Winslet as the leads I mention. Quills also had Michael Caine, Joaqaine Phoenix, and Billy Whitelaw, so quite a cast.

As you might expect, director Benoit Jacquot gives us a historical drama, in comparison to Kaufman's heated and nicely sin-tinged one. They were made in the same year, 2000. Without a doubt, Sade would be the most accurate, if that's important to you.

Sade is shot rather conventionally, is never in doubt that it's a period piece and so, feels authentic, but quite dry. Don't expect the humour, sex or theatrics of Quills and savour the story of this scandalous man, as he wrote lewd manuscripts and got them smuggled out to publishers via the young girl.

Auteill takes a while to get going - too many real-life activities hinder the Marquis engaging with his young charge - when he does, he starts to show that sexually charismatic spell that he casts - the sort that all manipulating brainwashers seem to possess.

Hardly a review exists and I cannot find an age rating for it. Explicitly it is quite tame until the last scene which would be rated as 18.

If you enjoy authentic historical drama, especially French and are interested in the Sade, the man, rather than a sensationalised account of what he did, then this film may be for you. It wasn't really for me, but I can see its virtues.

i finally got the chance to watch this flick and it was OK. the story is fine and some interesting moments.

but the performances were so weak and Boring. they all looked like they were asleep, especially the actor actor who played the marquise.

he didn't show emotion and he doesn't have the charisma and personality to play Sade.

Geoffreys performance in Quills may have been a little inaccurate but it still was much better and entertaining.

not only Geoffrey was better also Kate Winslet as The Marquie's muse.

another problem in this movie well there is not a memorable villain like Michael Caine

This is an extremely competent movie technically. The camera work and direction are excellent and the acting is fine as well--especially the fine acting by Daniel Auteuil as the Marquis. I really thought there were no problems at all with these aspects of the film. Instead, I was a bit annoyed by the way the Marquis was portrayed, as it didn't seem all that honest and seems to be a very revisionistic view of history. In fact, in recent years, the Marquis has undergone a bit of a transformation to a defender of freedom with great insight, not the fat sado-masochist rapist he really was. In a way, this is highly reminiscent of the whitewash given in THE PEOPLE VERSUS LARRY FLINT--where these men are elevated to hero status. Even if you don't think that the Marquis' perversions weren't all that bad (they included rapes and extreme violence), his portrayal in this film as a "sexual social worker" in this prison seems pretty silly. Instead of the violent and selfish Sade, he spends a lot of time carefully grooming a young virgin and slowly helps her to explore her own sensuality. What a nice and kind man. In fact, now that I think about it, this performance reminds me of the man Maurice Chavalier played in GIGI (but without the singing)--a cute older man who loves the ladies. I strongly doubt the real-life Marquis de Sade would have recognized this character at all!

The film, surprisingly, doesn't have a lot of nudity, though what it does show is extremely explicit. Only a maniac would let their kids see this as this is a very adult drama. It's very well-made and pretty entertaining--just not all that truthful. The director admits that the film is largely fictional in the interview among the special features on the DVD I watched. So go ahead and see the film if you'd like--understanding it just isn't very good historically. During the 18th century, sexual libertines were quite accepted in France as they were pretty broad-minded, so despite what the movie implies it wasn't SEX that was the issue, it was the violence and rape that was (and still is) the problem.

The title is a misnomer:the movie depicts barely one year of the so-called "divin marquis" .Twas a hard time for him 'cause he was threatened by the guillotine :the quiet joys of the reign of Terror .

Historically speaking,the background is rather sketchy: "the fête De l'et re supreme",Robespierre's failed attempt to create a secular religion,his downfall ,a heaven sent opportunity for showing Doctor Guillotin's sinister machine at work (full speed).

As far as Sade is concerned ,it's a downright mediocre affair :he's waiting in a former nunnery with other nobles ,a golden cage if you compare it to ,say,Marie-Antoinette's or scientist Lavoisier's fates,and he exchanges futile conversations with a young virgin about death,love and other trivia.There's the obligatory "daring" scene but you've got to be patient because it's a long time before it comes on the screen.And anyway ,by today's standards ,can we call that risqué? Cy Enfield's "De Sade" ,which enjoys one of the lowest ratings of the IMDb ,is at least entertaining ,and Keir Dullea was a more credible marquis than the aging Auteuil.And it featured John Huston.

This movie deals more with Sade as a philosopher than with the sex-addict whose writings later gave birth to a new disciplin : sexology. The Sade depicted here begins to age and is the prey of anxiety for his life (his life is threatened by Robsespierre' s hatred in the revolutionary turmoil) and about getting old and still having some books and plays to write. In 1794, he sits in a "luxury" prison, thanks to the help of his mistress who "sees" a friend of Robespierre, and undertakes to complete the "education" of a young Emilie de Lancry. He first faces the hostility of his environment, who is too aware of his reputation, but then, since they are all there eventually to be waiting for their death, they respond in various degrees to his claims for spiritual freedom and to take advantage of the joys of the moment that could be the last. Auteuil has always been a good actor but he is truly magnificent here and is by himself enough of a good reason to see the film...

I remember there has been another movie about de Sade in 2000. French Sade was more philosophically inclined, whereas international production Quills went for a theatrical experiment.

The problems with Sade arise if you're informed about the main protagonist beyond the image of grumpy adventurer delivered in the movie. But this is also where we might ask ourselves whether movies about historical events should be based on facts or author's vision.

Either way, Marquis de Sade is past his heyday and seemingly with some regrets. He needs some convincing in order to expose the youngsters to the pleasures of the flesh, eventually revealing just a fraction of his experience. I guess the historical figure wouldn't have hesitated from using and abusing everyone in sight, especially if there had been a possibility to get away with it.

The movie paints de Sade's portrait as a disillusioned eccentric rather than a homicidal pervert he actually had been. Therefore only two stars.

Daniel Auteuil makes an excellent Marquis de Sade (even better than Geoffrey Rush in Quills) in this intelligent film by one of France's very best directors, Benoit Jacquot (The School of Flesh, Pas De Scandale). Unlike the aforementioned Philip Kaufman picture, which examined the issue of censorship by using Sade and his work as a backdrop, this film intends to explore the sides of the infamous pornographer as philanthropist. While being held prisoner in a grand chateau with many other nobles following the French revolution, Sade befriends a curious young woman and teaches her a thing or two about growing up. The relationship they develop is genuine and in the end very moving, mostly because while instructing her to loosen up she teaches him how he can reclaim his emotional self and learn to once again love the society that he has dismissed as conventional and narrow. Not Jacquot's best, but a worthy piece of work.

Only one thing hampered my total enjoyment of this film: Isild le Besco, with her Asian looks, cannot possibly be the child of Jean-Pierre Cassel and Dominique Reymond. Otherwise this is far better than Kaufman's Quills as a portrait of Sade. Daniel Auteuil is always at home in costume parts (remember him as the doomed officer in The Widow of St. Pierre?) and his ease with the part is wonderful. This is a more thoughtful, more world-weary debauched aristocrat than the caricature that Geoffrey Rush gave us. My favorite scene: dinner at the prison, Sade musing about Robespierre's belief in a supreme being--would that be solid, or a gas perhaps?--as he courts Emilie, under the watchful eyes of her parents.

Benoit Jacquot has made a film that is more accessible than some he has done. There is a Bressonian austerity to some of his past films that this one thankfully lacks. The Marquis had the ability to appeal to your love of liberty and hatred for tyranny, at the same time as making you appalled when you sit down to read his novels. Jacquot knows this and plays down the writing.

As our republic turns to an Empire under another mad King George, it is interesting to see in another time the responses of power-mad people who are sex obsessed and repressed to a libertine.

For the first time, I began to understand 'why Napoleon'? As we see the French aristocrats in their maggot-laden prison (evoking the maggot-laden aristocracy and their excesses?), we come to view the soon-to-be headless from another perspective. As far as I'm concerned, deSade is merely an excuse for showing us how it is to face death daily. These people because of their wealth could afford to pay to live in this 'asylum'. Most assuredly, seeing the headless, former friends of yours dumped into ditches outside your 'chateau' would drive you mad....knowing your own fate lay mere feet away. The guillotine, also erected nearby provided yet another view. In order to inject a little humor in what otherwise is unbearable (how many of you remembered the photographs at Auschwitz when you saw the ditches filled with the bodies?), we see the French peasants on burial detail throwing the heads from one to another. We are then told by a young man, obsessed with watching the daily parade of tumbrels to the burial ditches (formerly gardens-- growing vegetables that you watch uprooted....what pictorial analogies!!!) that "They are wedging the heads into the bodies." Scuse me for pulling a Henry James on you.

Autiell is indeed magnificent. Having just seen "The Widow" where he plays a sheriff about to USE the visiting guillotine on a good man, I thought the role-reversal was a great perspective for him. As Sade, he too faces the blade: as Ropespierre, in his obsession to force belief in a diety on the French, is trying to execute de Sade as an example of a 'godless atheist'. (Can you be an atheist without being godless? Seeming redundancies fascinate me.) I could not hear this announcement without thinking of our clear disregard for the Constitutional separation of church and state in our 'under God' interruption of the nice cadences of the Pledge of Allegiance. I'm old enough to have learned the Pledge when it wasn't hampered with a reminder of our careless disregard of the Bill of Rights.

Of course, there's a sex scene. Which raises the question, "Is it men who get turned on by violence?" To me, it was repulsive. Being introduced to sex by a gang bang would have made me frigid, I'm thinking. Yet, as Auteill tastefully points out to the young man whom he has just had whip him, "You're hard; that's good." Is that why men like violent movies? And is that why they can, with logic-tight compartments in place, cry out against movies with sex scenes while loving an Arnold Schwarzenburger 'kill-all with loud guns and lots of blood' fest? They have been sexually satiated with the violence, so need no 'cissy love-with-sex' scenes? The idea that adultery is worse than mass and/or state-sanctioned mass murder by my country-men still astounds me!! But maybe, this is a partial explanation.

Sade is aging, and it would have been more convincing for the maiden's introduction to sex, had Auteill not been so sexy and full of chemistry himself, as it oozes out of the screen, as though we had the ability to pump phenomes through the air!!! Museum of Fine Arts in Boston has a great auditorium (where I saw this film), but it ain't there yet!! See 'Quills', see 'Marat/Sade' and see this. All different viewpoints of a very complex point in French and world history.

Not too long ago we had an excellent portrayal of the Marquis de Sade by Geoffrey Rush in "Quills," a well acted, fast-paced, tense distortion of Sade's stay at the notorious Charenton insane asylum. Plucking at our compassion demanding decent treatment of the mentally ill and our general revulsion against extreme physical "cures" for madness, "Quills" reminded us of the bad old days when the insane were brutalized by the inhumane.

Now we have a very different marquis in "Sade," a film that has received some extravagant and, in my view, not fully deserved praise. It is a very interesting film, worth seeing (the full-scale guillotine in action is worth the price of admission). But it's not great.

Daniel Auteuil (Sade) is a very fine actor, one of the most interesting and versatile in both English and French language roles. His Sade is remarkably laid back given the Terror, the uncertainty of survival in a rest home cum upper class jail. For a man whose writings are permeated with lurid descriptions of sexual acts of every kind and who describes his own participation on most pages of many books, Auteuil's Sade comes across as a man on holiday from his perversions. Geoffrey Rush was closer to the soul of Sade (he had one, you know).

Sade befriends a very able actress, Isild Le Besco, "Emilie," an awakening teenage noblewoman at first repelled by and then saturninely attracted to her new mentor. Sade informs her that he is indeed a "libertine" who has done it all but, unfortunately, he expresses himself with the same passion that a first time-invited dinner guest to my home will mention that he is a vegetarian.

The real marquis was a fiery character and not just on paper. Imprisoned (as he was most of his life), he rallied angry protestors outside the walls of his jail with such effect that he was immediately whisked off the premises to another facility. Thus he missed the storming of the Bastille the next day (which would have resulted in at least his temporary liberation), an event that has given France a great holiday and made it easier for many to remember my birthday.

The machinations of Robespierre (and one of his lieutenants who shares a bed with Sade's still involved mistress, by whom he has a cute kid,) are almost tepid given the fervor of that madman's mode of governance. So tame is this Robespierre that I almost felt badly for him when he went for the Big Haircut.

Auteuil is much too detached for his character and for the times. When he expounds on his libertine philosophy to Emilie and anyone who will listen he sounds like a present day alternative-press sex columnist on a time warp trip. Sade stirred things up wherever he was confined. In this film even the one scene of intense sexual passion appears to almost bore him.

The cinematography is impressive. Perhaps to avoid being described as a period piece, instead of music associated with the French Revolution (not a bar of the Marsellaise) the music of Poulenc provides some of the background. Poulenc and the French Revolution?

An interesting but overpraised film.

While there is much to admire in the performances, writing, and photography (especially the way the Marquis' sometimes greenish-black hue contrasts to Emilie's fair skin), the central thesis of the film is a little hard to swallow. Setting the story right at the nadir of revolutionary excess, where the nobility are being decapitated in the hundreds, the film-makers advance the notion that all the raping, maiming, and torturing in Sade's books are merely a joyous upwelling of the Life Forces amidst so much horror, like William Blake writing in a refugee camp. Yet this can only be made by transforming Sade from the bloodthirsty, all-screwing libertine that he was into a supercilious chattering class of one, a Cassandra who sees life even in the maggots swarming in his prison cell. Glimpses of his work are few and almost coy, while the sexual adventures of the other detainees get the full scan as neurotic and hypocritical. However they did recapture the dark wit that suffused Justine, and it that respect the Marquis is almost sympathetic.

Beautiful film where the action is mainly substantive. The story takes place in the period after the revolution, during which the population suffered under the terror of Robespierre and his associates. The grim, unhinged chaos in which friend and foe alike had to fear for their lives, and where everyone did everything to save their own skin, is depicted vividly. The atmosphere in and around the dilapidated Picpus convent is delectable. Isild Le Besco and Marianne Denicourt are truly captivating and Daniel Auteuil plays a wonderfully engaging Sade. It's impressive how Benoît Jacquot contrasts the literary perversity of De Sade with the much greater literal perversity of the revolution. Just because of the climax in the barn, this film probably wouldn't be allowed to be made today. All the snowflakes would go completely berserk. A great movie for anyone who loves French history.

a must see movie to (re)discover the real sweet and human philosophy of le marquis de sade.

the duo auteuil/jacquot builds the simplest and the finest image of should have be the true donatien alphonse françois de sade. DVD bonus provides multiple interesting point of view of the team interviews.

direction by benoit jacquot is simple and historically and in context very sharp.

It's more than a movie because it makes you understand the enormous paradox between the word "sadic" and one of our gentle , humanist , coherent , true, realist philosopher we ever had .