Orphée
1950 / 112m - France
Drama, Fantasy
0.5*/5.0*
Orpheus poster

Watches

May 10, 2021

0.5*/5.0*

I didn't like this Cocteau at all. Not that I was the biggest fan of the other Cocteau films I've seen so far, but I've always appreciated his attempts to create something otherworldly and different with his films. He tried to do the same with Orpheus, it's just that he failed horribly here.

Orphée is a poet who becomes infatuated with Princess Death. The princess quite likes Orphée too, but she's jealous of his wife, so she sends her cronies to help her on her way to the Underworld. Orphée may have developed feelings for Princess Death, but he is faithful to his wife and travel to the Underworld to get her back.

The performances are weak, conversations are terribly overstated, Cocteau's attempts to create a fantasy world are meager, and the soundtrack is annoying. There's just very little left of the creativity and atmosphere he was able to create in his earlier films, this was just poorly executed and felt terribly misplaced.