J’s review published on Letterboxd:
I definitely regret not seeing this in the theatre because it's as brilliant as everybody says. every sigh in between the dance movements where every whip of the hands sends off a heavy air of unrelenting force and every touch of the feet upon the floor echoes the magnitude of violence and manipulation. it is disturbingly engrossing; a ritual so hideously done it's not so hard to be caught up and mesmerised with all the gut-pulling, bone-cracking, skin-crawling witchcraft underneath the seemingly usage of the French language as an incantation and the hard-hitting rigidity of the German language. beautiful and spell-binding with all the bleak and cold winter season as warm and hot as the blood oozing and forming under bruised skin and wounded faces. I am entranced. suddenly, Dakota Johnson is strangely attractive to me (also doing my best not to reference the 'she's the mother I never had...' Oprah meme).
disclaimer: I haven't seen the 1977 version so I'm curious to know if I'd still feel the same about this after I get around that.
