This sexually charged costume drama from French provocateur Catherine Breillat (Fat Girl) finds still another gorgeous young French rake fighting a duel and never quite choosing between two great loves.

| Jun 1, 2020

Mostly the actors are just saddled with a stiff screenplay that should have been fluid. The film seems as if its never quite sure where it wants to go.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jul 6, 2019

[Director Catherine Breillat's] vision of cruelty and empathy operating hand in hand in human nature gives her enormous freedom to inflect dramatic conventions.

| Oct 12, 2018

The director Catherine Breillat's period adaptation of an 1851 novel by Barbey d'Aurevilly delivers sex and pain with style and conviction that render her familiar themes new again.

| Dec 1, 2014

| Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 16, 2011

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 16, 2011

The Last Mistress displays the director's contempt for conventionality in clear, ringing tones.

| Aug 15, 2011

Breillat's unflinching instinct for the doomed, all-consuming pull of sexual obsession shakes the story up in rewarding ways.

| Sep 10, 2010

An elegant film about an irresistible hot romance.

| Original Score: B | Jul 15, 2009

Rather boring.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Oct 18, 2008

It is an outstandingly intelligent, formally pleasing film, and a fascinating development for Breillat herself.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 18, 2008

It's devastating.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 18, 2008

All of the characters are so elusive and thin there's nothing to grab our interest.

Full Review | Original Score: 1.5/4 | Oct 18, 2008

The characters ultimately feel more like pawns to be manipulated, rather than flesh-and-blood human beings who suffer and love, which gives the film's message that the two are essentially one in the same a rather hollow ring.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Oct 18, 2008

| Original Score: B | Oct 18, 2008

| Original Score: B | Oct 18, 2008

Argento seizes each scene with both hands, adding surprising layers of feeling as she goes.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 18, 2008

[An] entertaining, elegantly shot adaptation of Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly's 19th century novel.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 18, 2008

There was a point about midway through "The Last Mistress" when I was honestly wondering if it was intentionally bad.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Sep 26, 2008

Seldom have a filmmaker and lead actress performed in perfect, artistic sync.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 25, 2008