The Unfaithful Wife: French Version - Movie Review Example

The paper "Claude Chabrol’s Role in The Unfaithful Wife" is a perfect example of a movie review on visual arts and film studies. Derek Malcolm is a film critic and has considered the film Unfaithful Wife citing various opinions regarding Claude Chabrol’s role in the movie. This movie tries to give a story of a family that felt upset after the husband had to murder the lover to his wife. However, the family was previously happy before the incident occurred. Also, after the wife’s lover was killed, the family came back to harmony merely because the woman developed respect towards her husband’s actions and braveness (Tarokic 65).

Derek Malcolm had some statements regarding Claude Chabrol’s actions in this film. Chabrol portrayed some styles and execution which Malcolm criticized when reviewing the film.  According to Derek Malcolm, Chabrol examines the well-fed French who are of highly privileged class (bourgeois) generating emotional heat. Hitchcock is one of Chabrol’s inspirations and it would be hard to be sure of Chabrol’s styles (Hitchcock et al 14). First, I agree with Malcolm’s review of the whole film and also regarding the bourgeois as stated by Chabrol.

The bourgeois is the kind of people who are highly privileged and live real lives in society. In this case, the less privileged in society are exploited. Sometimes the middle-class groups of people are frequently encountered with some dark and dangerous passion for something. Therefore, this film does not revolve around crime stories but talks much of marital tragedy about the bourgeois. Similarly, Chabrol state that he is not against or does not discourage marriages but among the bourgeois family, love should exist between the parents and children (Tarokic 64).

Moreover, the film clearly shows how middle-class people who have almost everything but live a life that is boring and detached. This family of Helen and Charles put their whole interest in their only son. It also portrays the relationship in marriages full of jealousy. It was emotional for Helen after realizing that her husband could even kill a person because of her. This was shown by the tension and sadness in her face for the loss of her lover. In the other case of Unfaithful wife; Derek claims that the film was supposed to be horrifying but it was displayed in ironic humor and irresistible logic which does not bring the aspect of terror.

The film was pure and clearly seen as a typical story even by the late 50s standards. Therefore, Derek claims that Chabrol knew the film was going to be that way simple. Also when Charles was disposing of the body of a dead person the movie was full of entertainment other than terrifying. The parts that seemed funny and also heart-stopping leaving a person amazed was when the husband visited Victor and introduced himself politely. About other movies, such a situation was to be horrifying since something bad was to happen.

For example, Charles said that they had not to interfere with another person’s marital or private lives. It was gentle at first when he mentioned to Victor about the affair with his wife before he built up the anger. Moreover, Charles realized that his wife was cheating on him after getting concrete information from the private detective and as a result murder came in. therefore, the discovery of unfaithfulness leads to the death of Victor. The other evidence that Charles used to confirm the truth was his wife’s anniversary gift that was possessed by Victor.

The husband did not know that his wife was unfaithful and he built his anger after realizing it.The other section that Derek Malcolm identified concerned the efforts of the man to cover up his crime traces. This is one of the amazing parts of this film. After the murder incident, the man tried to clean the house and drag the body in a sack to the nearby water body (lake). Although it has been done so many times in other films, it was one of the awful processes to have been experienced. Similarly, the wife discovers that Charles (husband) has killed Victor (lover) therefore; she worked out her plans quickly by clearing all the traces of evidence.

For example, Helen accidentally discovered a picture that could be used by the police to incriminate her husband and he ended up being silent to cover the story. The police tried to interrogate her but she failed to give her husband to the police although she knew he was guilty. Therefore she became silent instead of telling the truth to the police. On seeing how her wife behaved in front of the authority, Charles left some encouraging words to her wife. Charles told her wife how madly he loves her and this overwhelmed Helen.

Therefore, she realized that Charles loves her so much. Helen then walks towards her husband smiling and this indicates they still love each other. Chabrol examines the happily married couple and how their relationship was disturbed by infidelity leading to a tragic result at the end. The characters were awesome and they displayed their strength, weakness and also their attractiveness (Milchan 57).