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Anatomy of Hell
Generally unfavorable reviews
Based on 19 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 7 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama | Foreign
Written by: Catherine Breillat (also novel Pornocratie)
Directed by: Catherine Breillat
Release Date:
Theatrical: September 24, 2004
DVD: January 11, 2005
Running Time: 80 minutes, Color
Origin: France
Language(s): French (with English subtitles)
Summary
RATING: Not Rated
Starring Amira Casar, Rocco Siffredi, Alexandre Belin, Manuel Taglang, Jacques Monge, Claudio Carvalho, Carolina Lopes, and Catherine Breillat (narrator)
A daring exploration into the nature of a fundamentally social and religious taboo: sexuality.
Also On Metacritic
FILM: A Real Young Girl Fat Girl Romance Sex is Comedy
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Variety Lisa Nesselson
Compact, ultra-explicit two-character pic about what transpires when a beautiful straight woman hires a handsome gay man to "look" at her is gloriously mannered, proudly pretentious and undeniably compelling.
Read Full Review >Village Voice J. Hoberman
Anatomy of Hell gives a feminist twist to a French literary tradition that goes back to the Marquis de Sade. It's also svelte, assured filmmaking.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Ken Fox
If you're feeling open-minded and a little adventurous, this chilling exploration of the gender gap from Gallic bad-girl Catherine Breillat is worth a look.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas
What follows is graphic, but it's too cerebral and too challenging to be dismissed as pornography.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
The surprise of Anatomy of Hell is that Siffredi's character is ultimately more vulnerable than the woman
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
The award for hardest-to-watch movie of the year.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
Breillat's mix of dramatic skill and feminist intimidation has cowed plenty of critics in the past, but no political agenda could redeem this movie's joyless pedantry.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
Even without the difficult imagery, Breillat's grim observations on men, women, and sexual orientation, are tough to take.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Homophobic, sex-phobic, maybe even human-phobic.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Achy Obejas
Although several of her (Breillat's) previous films were intriguing and provocative, this one seems styled more as raw material for satire on "Mad TV" or "Saturday Night Live."
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
There are scenes here where Breillat deliberately disgusts us, not because we are disgusted by the natural life functions of women, as she implies, but simply because The Woman does things that would make any reasonable Man, or Woman, for that matter, throw up.
Read Full Review >New York Post V.A. Musetto
Ranks high on the squirm meter. But, unlike in most of her earlier work, there's no emotional payoff.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Ty Burr
Despite all that onscreen turgidness, Anatomy of Hell is itself so much a matter of the mind that it never rises above theory.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
Breillat is a smart, serious observer of sexuality's often disruptive role in human life, but this existential drama is sadly pretentious.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck
Despite its copious nudity, it is less likely to incite lust among its viewers than a strong desire for a long hot shower.
Read Full Review >The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann
The dialogue that is wrapped around the sexual activities only helps to make the film disgustingly ridiculous.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Manohla Dargis
Anatomy of Hell is more than a lapse; it is a brutal self-parody of a filmmaker who, having stripped down to the nitty-gritty once too often, may finally have nothing left to show.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Ella Taylor
Anatomy of Hell offers one of the most hateful and mechanical representations of sexuality I've ever seen.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 4.4 (out of 10) based on 7 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Ken B. gave it a9:
If this movie made you uncomfortable, then perhaps its truth has hit too close to home. This film is a frank exposure, not only of body parts, but of the endless conflict between the sexuallity of men versus that of women. I was fascinated by the honesty.
Rico gave it a0:
Hell is right! The movie not only hates its characters but its audience also. This isn't art.
Pierre A. gave it a0:
C'est une filme terrible par l'enfant terrible!
Adam R. gave it a 2:
I dare you to eat something after watching this mess.
Justin A. gave it a 9:
In the way that Breillat's earlier Fat Girl presented itself as a foil to 400 blows, Anatomy of Hell foils Hiroshima, Mon Amour (with all of its heavy-handed, overblown dialgoue). This movie, for all of its flaws, is truly beautful. Breillat is best when she's showing and not telling; she is a visual theorist who would be better with the sound off (she also seems to have terrible taste in music, unless, of course, there is a point to her garrish soundtracks that I'm missing, which is probably the case.) If you have not seen many of the director's films, this is not a good place to start. However, Anatomy nicely continues the exploration of the feminine's attempt to appropriate sexuality from the violence and repulsion of the masculine. It does feel like a continuation, rather than a starting point. See A Real Young Girl, 36 Fillette, Perfect Love, Romance, and Fat Girl (or at least one or two of them) first.
