Romance
ロマンスX
Storyline
The whole story, ending included.
A teacher whose boyfriend refuses her seeks sex elsewhere, including with a porn star; Breillat's manifesto on the female body.
Marie teaches at a primary school and lives with Paul, whom she loves. They have been together only a few months, and already he will not sleep with her. He lies beside her fully dressed, says he is simply not in the mood, and turns away. One night, unable to bear it, she goes out to a bar, meets a stranger called Paolo and kisses him. When they meet again they sleep together. She tells him she has a husband who will not touch her, and she makes him wear a condom, because the only child she wants is Paul's. She does not see Paolo again.
Robert, the headmaster of her school, is a plain, talkative man who boasts of having slept with ten thousand women. He invites her home, and they begin a relationship built on bondage. The first time he ties and gags her she is overcome by fear and cries, and he stops. She goes back to him anyway, and afterwards they go out to dinner together. One evening, in the stairwell of her own building, a stranger rapes her. She tells Paul none of it.
When Paul finally sleeps with her, she becomes pregnant. He is delighted, and he starts to drink. When her labour begins he lies in a stupor and does nothing to help. Marie turns on the gas and leaves, and Robert drives her to the hospital. While she gives birth to a son, the flat explodes and Paul is killed. At the cemetery Marie watches from a distance as his coffin is lowered, the baby in her arms.
Starring
Caroline Duceyas Marie
A primary-school teacher whose boyfriend will not sleep with her, and who goes looking for desire elsewhere.
Marie’s story
Marie loves Paul madly, and three months into their life together he will no longer touch her; she clings to him, she says, like a leech. She kisses a stranger, Paolo, in a bar, then sleeps with him, making him wear a condom because the only child she wants is Paul's. With Robert, her headmaster, she lets herself be tied up, cries with fear the first time, and goes back. A stranger rapes her in the stairwell of her building; she tells Paul nothing. Pregnant by Paul, she watches him drink. As her labour begins and he lies in a stupor, she turns on the gas and walks out. Robert drives her to the hospital, and Paul dies in the explosion while she gives birth to a son. At the funeral she stands apart, the baby in her arms.
Sagamore Stéveninas Paul
Marie's boyfriend, who says he loves her but refuses her in bed, and drinks his way through her pregnancy.
Paul’s story
Paul, a model, has been with Marie three months. At night he lies beside her fully dressed and turns away, telling her he is simply not in the mood; her appetite, he says, is disgusting. He would rather drink sake and read Bukowski alone in his favourite Japanese restaurant, or watch television until he falls asleep. He knows nothing of Paolo, of Robert, or of the stranger in the stairwell. When he finally sleeps with her she becomes pregnant, and no one is happier than he is. Then he starts to drink. On the night her labour begins, he lies in a stupor and does nothing to help. She turns on the gas and leaves, and he is killed when the flat explodes.
François Berléandas Robert
The headmaster of Marie's school, a boastful seducer who draws her into a relationship built on bondage.
Rocco Siffredias Paolo
A stranger Marie meets in a bar late at night, the first man she sleeps with outside her relationship.
Why it matters
Romance puts a woman's desire at the centre of the film and does not make it tidy. Marie loves a man who will not touch her, and the film follows her as she tries to keep love and sex apart, looking for the second with strangers in order to protect the first. Catherine Breillat filmed some of the sex for real and cast the pornographic actor Rocco Siffredi, and censors had to decide what that made it: in Australia it was refused classification before winning an R18+ rating on appeal, a decision that made room for real sex within that category. Consent, the question inside the story, did not stay there. In 2024 Caroline Ducey published a memoir accusing Breillat of enabling a sexual assault on her while the stairwell scene was filmed; Breillat denies it. The film now carries two arguments at once: about what a woman wants, and about what was asked of the woman who played her.