Roman Polanski follows Carnage with another stage adaptation, this time David Ives’ psychosexual drama riffing on gender, role-play and art. Confined to a playhouse in Paris, it’s theatrical but increasingly fascinating as an arrogant director (Mathieu Amalric) auditions an actress (Emmanuelle Seigner) for a stage version of the titular novel about sexual submission.
During the course of the evening, the duo’s roles shift and a battle of the sexes escalates. Intriguingly, VIF recalls both Polanski’s early films and his own life – Seigner is his actual wife and there’s pointed discussion of child abuse.
