One of the last important works by visionary filmmaker and celebrated novelist Alain Robbe-Grillet (Trans-Europ Express, Last Year at Marienbad), La Belle Captive is a mesmerizing erotic fantasy, set in a world in which film noir and horror converge-an alternate reality governed by the fractured continuity of a nightmare.After encountering a mysterious woman (Gabrielle Lazure) at a smoke-filled nightclub, secret agent Walter Raim (Daniel Mesguich) finds the woman lying bound and semi-conscious ona country road. He takes her to an isolated mansion, where a group of mysterious men have gathered. In the morning, Walter awakens to find bite marks on his neck, and embarks on a one-man crusade to unravel the mystery. But his detective work is thwartedby leather-clad, motorcycle-riding femme fatale Sara Zeitgeist (Cyrielle Clair), who commands a squad of black-shirted goons to keep Walter from attaining the object of his quest.Inspired by the imagery of Rene Magritte and the episodic melodramasof Louis Feuillade, La Belle Captive is a playful homage to the erotic allure of cinema, filled with fetishistic imagery that has become Robbe-Grillet's trademark.
