French precursor to Psycho? To that I say: pooh-pooh, let’s ditch the retroactive casting-of-shadows, because the differences are eminent. I mean, sure there’s the twin foregrounding of cut-both-ways misogyny: Hitchcock liked to dress ‘em up as much as down, and in a similar vein, Les Diaboliques kicks off inside a pulpy her-on-her hotbox, before quickly inducing vertigo with the return of the patriarchal overseer. Yet Clouzot doesn’t have half the restraint of the omni-chinned Brit, and that kind of dollhouse bruising alone won’t cut it.

Fact is, nothing will – ‘least not until he’s managed to reveal everyone for the miserable two-faced maggot they really are (audience included). Some will resist, no doubt – you could argue that this kind of calculated mean-spiritedness is empty and nihilistic, the kind of thing that lies behind mass tragedy – but for those who do, pay attention to that opening quote, then note the surroundings: boarding-school-as-mausoleum, two-bit motel, the chorus of wailing children. This is more vomiting swamp than gas chamber, more bile-grenade than surgical knife. It’s not even that tense, just uncanny. The world is a fucked-up place, and sometimes people like Clouzot need to get our hands dirty in order to remind us of that simple yet evasive fact.—David Levinson

» Henri-Georges Clouzot | France | 1955