GAMES: GameSpot | GameFAQs MUSIC: Last.fm | MP3.com MOVIES: Metacritic | Movietome TV: TV.com
Home | About Metacritic | About Metascores | What's New | Wireless Versions | Discussion Forums | Advertising Inquiries | Contact Us | RSS
Metacritic.com: We Deal With Criticism
     Help
> Switch to Advanced Search  
Film Video/DVD Music Games TV

DVD and Video

Upcoming Release Calendar
Awards & Bests By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

 



 

Printer-Friendly Version Email This Page Discuss In Our Forums

Bridesmaid, The (La Demoiselle d'Honneur)
First Run Features

Bridesmaid, The (La Demoiselle d'Honneur) reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 74 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
7.6 out of 10
based on 20 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 3 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Starring Benoît Magimel, Laura Smet, Aurore Clément, Bernard Le Coq, Solène Bouton, Anna Mihalcea, Michel Duchaussoy, and Suzanne Flon

It's love at first sight when bridesmaid Senta falls into the life handsome young Philippe at the wedding of his younger sister. Though their passion for each other is as obvious as it is unquestionable, Philippe soon discovers that Senta's life is shrouded in mystery and her stories surrounding her past anything but believable. When one day she asks Philippe for a terrible proof of his love, Philippe must come to terms with who his lover might really be. But is this just another of Senta’s fantastic tales? And how far is Philippe willing to go, even as his love for her seems to know no limits? (First Run Features)


GENRE(S): Drama  |  Foreign  |  Romance  |  Suspense/Thriller  
WRITTEN BY: Claude Chabrol
Pierre Leccia
Ruth Rendell (novel)
 
DIRECTED BY: Claude Chabrol  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: March 20, 2007 
Theatrical: August 4, 2006 
RUNNING TIME: 110 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: France / Germany / Italy 
LANGUAGE(S): French (with English subtitles) 

Original title "La Demoiselle d'Honneur"

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...

88
Miami Herald Marta Barber
The touch of sharp and edgy storytelling has returned to French master Claude Chabrol.
Read Full Review
88
Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
A classic of realistic terror, in which passion and murder can't lie buried.
Read Full Review
83
The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray
The Bridesmaid goes slack at times, as it follows multiple Magimel family subplots, but as always, Chabrol stages everything with an elegant economy, moving the camera in short bursts that direct the eye but don't distract. Still, the movie would fail completely if not for the dynamic between the two leads.
Read Full Review
80
The New York Times Manohla Dargis
Deceptively understated and finally ferocious.
Read Full Review
80
The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann
Chabrol insured the power of this dangerously difficult film with perfect casting. The two lovers are so well acted that their story--and its finish--are incredibly convincing.
Read Full Review
80
Washington Post Desson Thomson
Chabrol arranges his story with a subtle, almost clinical accumulation. And it takes close attention to the movie's seemingly innocuous details to understand his deeper purposes.
Read Full Review
80
Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
Claude Chabrol makes his particular kind of unnerving, deliciously amoral thrillers look easy. Once you've made as many of them as he has, they probably are.
Read Full Review
75
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
Chabrol's deliberate and drawn-out observations often work against the dramatic tension, but his gift is making the audience believe that emotion and obsession trump logic for these deluded characters.
Read Full Review
75
Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
If The Bridesmaid is middle-drawer Chabrol, it's almost worth going to just to watch Laura Smet, a vamp of not-so-basic instinct.
Read Full Review
75
San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
Claude Chabrol has a wonderful way of making audiences nervous.
Read Full Review
75
New York Post V.A. Musetto
The film flawlessly glides along as bodies start piling up. The finale brings to mind another Hitchcock film, "Psycho."
Read Full Review
75
New York Daily News Jack Mathews
The Bridesmaid is fairly familiar Chabrol country, an exploration of the psychological undercurrent of the bourgeoisie, with heavy helpings of black comedy.
Read Full Review
75
Boston Globe Ty Burr
The film reveals its secrets slowly, and Chabrol tightens the screws not according to the rules of Hollywood suspense but with a cool, level gaze.
Read Full Review
70
Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
A prickly, twisted, mean-spirited, borderline crazy and highly seductive picture.
Read Full Review
70
The Hollywood Reporter Ray Bennett
Based on the novel by Ruth Rendell, the film could do well with audiences who have a taste for creepy films about murder in the suburbs.
Read Full Review
70
Variety Deborah Young
At 74, Chabrol is in full possession of his talent for elegant, understated filmmaking, though he's far from his disturbing films of the '50s and '60s.
Read Full Review
70
Village Voice Michael Atkinson
Chabrol sets us up, of course, which is half the fun, and the experience is a delight for lack of pomposity (his visual storytelling remains no-nonsense) as well as genre expertise.
Read Full Review
70
Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
This 2004 French feature seems concerned not so much with the psychopathology of everyday life as with psychopaths who lurk behind the everyday.
Read Full Review
67
Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten
The final payoff is a good one and relates to something tossed out in the film's opening minutes. Still, this is middling Chabrol, not as tight and suspenseful as his best work.
Read Full Review
50
Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
A merrily macabre things-we-do-for-love yarn.
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 7.6 (out of 10) based on 3 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Paul K. gave it an8:
I enjoyed this on so many different levels. <***SPOILER****> The acting was consistantly good and although the story wasn't as solid as it could have been, the ambigous climatic ending was pitch perfect. If you have an interest, definitely see this in the theater or on video.

Discuss this movie in our forums

Return to top of page
Home | FILM | DVD/VIDEO | MUSIC | GAMES | TV | Forums | About Metacritic metacritic.com

Popular on CBS sites: iPhone 3G | Fantasy Football | Moneywatch | Antivirus Software | Recipes | E3 2009

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use