Dir. Catherine Breillat
Starring Caroline Ducey, Rocco Siffredi, and François Berléand
84 min.
In Romance (1999), a schoolteacher breaks away from a frustrated relationship with her withholding boyfriend in order to engage in a series of sexual encounters, exploring the furthest ends of her sexual desires in an attempt at self-discovery. A simultaneous scandal and triumph for the iconic director Catherine Breillat—a champion of transgressive and introspective explorations of female sexuality—Romance was smacked with an “X” rating by censors upon its release (and in some cases banned altogether), prompting a far-reaching critical dialogue about the limits and politics of depicting female sexuality in mainstream cinema.
