France Private - The Sexual Adventures of a Married Man - DVD

Content: The days when Etienne (Patrick Zocco) felt sexually attracted to his wife Christine (Valérie Maes) are long gone. He lives in a frustrating daily grind from which he is desperate to break out. When he meets young Juliette (Lizzie Brocheré) in a cemetery, he is quickly attracted to the attractive student. They begin a passionate affair designed to give him the very thing his married life can no longer provide: Joy, joy and more joy! While his wife becomes more and more lonely, Etienne keeps getting his satisfaction from his young lovers Juliette and Juliette (Christine Armanger). But as he becomes increasingly possessive of the two girls, his newfound happiness seems headed for a tragic end...

The Sexual Adventures of a Married Man is the second film released in the France Private series. While The Sexual Secrets of a Family offered a rather straightforward production aside from some very explicit sex scenes, Lou Viger and Jacky Katu's film feels more like an experimental art project, a primarily improvised, very unwieldy look at young women's search for their place in life and an older man's escape from his married life. With very choppy camerawork, statements spoken directly into the camera, and long scenes in which the Juliettes are seen repeatedly riding bicycles through the city, the drama quickly proves to be very tiring and only mildly involving.

The Sexual Secrets of a Family possessed a certain closeness to life. Certainly, the question arose here and there whether the depiction of sex really should have been so explicit. Still, the film somehow felt authentic and engaging. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of The Sexual Adventures of a Married Man. The effortfully artful camera work, for example, which is very close to the faces of the protagonists, shows only parts of them or shows them from an angle above, builds up a distance to the viewer, as do the not always comprehensible cuts to moments that do not belong to the scene. The actors' acting, which is more reminiscent of theatre acting, further emphasises this artificial character of the production.

In addition, the development of the characters also seems difficult to follow. The only character with whom one can still identify to some extent as an audience member is the betrayed Christine. But all in all the characters as well as the whole story lack the accessibility that would be necessary to integrate the viewer into the events. Thus, The Sexual Adventures of a Married Man comes across as an experimental film that wants to be high art too much to offer viewers anything like simple entertainment anymore. As an art film, it certainly has some appeal for those interested. As a simple entertainment drama with an erotic touch, however, the work unfortunately doesn't work. For this there is then also only one: very conditionally worth seeing!

Picture + Sound: The amateur film look of the drama is also reflected in the audiovisual realization. The image looks choppy, washed out or blurry at many moments, though most of these are deliberately used stylistic devices. Still, it's rather hard to get comfortable with it as a viewer. The sound, which is available in Dolby Digital 5.1 in the German language version, makes the dialogue sound very powerful, but otherwise has hardly any effects to offer that would breathe a little life into the surround channels. For a low-budget arthouse film, however, this is perfectly fine. Good!

Extras: As a bonus, the disc only holds the trailer and other programming tips from the provider.

Conclusion: The Sexual Adventures of a Married Man is devoted to some very interesting themes, but Lou Viger and Jacky Katu are a bit too concerned with artistic pretension in their execution. This has resulted in a stylistically exhausting, dramaturgically half-baked and emotionally surprisingly undercooled drama, which unfortunately can not really live up to its claims. As an experimental work, the whole thing definitely has a certain appeal. But especially in comparison to The Sexual Secrets of a Family, which was also released in the series France Private, this film simply lacks entertainment value and relatable dramaturgy. And that makes The Sexual Adventures of a Married Man unfortunately only very conditionally worth seeing!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp