New Release: Belle de Jour DVD and Blu-ray

Release Date: Jan. 17, 2012
Price: DVD $29.95, Blu-ray $39.95
Studio: Criterion


Belle du Jour movie scene

Parisian housewife Catherine Deneuve is up against the wall in Belle de Jour.

The surreal and erotic 1967 “daydream” drama film Belle de Jour, from provocateur Luis Buñuel (Viridiana), is a classic movie that’s both an examination of desire and fetishistic pleasure, as well as a gently absurdist take on contemporary social mores and class divisions.

The porcelain perfection of Catherine Deneuve (Potiche) hides a cracked interior in the actress’ most iconic role: Séverine, a chilly Paris housewife by night, a bordello prostitute by day. Fantasy and reality commingle in Séverine’s head, just as they do in the viewer’s in the movie, which is recognized as one of Buñuel’s finest.

The film is presented in French with new and improved English subtitles. It got a new high-definition digital transfer and an uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition.

The following special features are included on the DVD and Blu-ray:

  • audio commentary featuring Michael Wood, author of the BFI Film Classics book Belle de jour
  • new video piece featuring writer and sexual-politics activist Susie Bright and film scholar Linda Williams
  • new interview with screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière
  • excerpt from the French television program Cinéma, featuring interviews with Carrière and actress Catherine Deneuve
  • original and American release trailers
  • booklet featuring an essay by critic Melissa Anderson and a 1970s interview with director Luis Buñuel
Buy or Rent Belle du Jour
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About Laurence

Founder and editor Laurence Lerman saw Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest when he was 13 years old and that’s all it took. He has been writing about film and video for more than a quarter of a century for magazines, anthologies, websites and most recently, Video Business magazine, where he served as the Reviews Editor for 15 years.