VENUS IN FUR

By Roman POLANSKI

LIONSGATE - as SALES All rights, World

Comedy - Completed 2012

A director becomes enslaved by desire after reluctantly agreeing to audition one last actress for the lead role of his play.

Festivals
& Awards

Festival de Cannes 2013
Competition
    • Year of production
    • 2012
    • Genres
    • Comedy, Erotic
    • Countries
    • FRANCE
    • Languages
    • FRENCH
    • Duration
    • 90 mn
    • Director(s)
    • Roman POLANSKI
    • Writer(s)
    • David IVES, Roman POLANSKI
    • EIDR
    • 10.5240/60B8-1F23-52FD-3BFF-51F3-W
    • Producer(s)
    • Robert BENMUSSA, Alain SARDE
    • Synopsis
    • From Academy Award®-winning director Roman Polanski comes the French-language film VENUS IN FUR, a brilliant, erotic comedy about a director who becomes enslaved by desire after reluctantly agreeing to audition one last actress for the lead role of his play. Adapted from David Ives’ Tony®-nominated play—the film stars Emmanuelle Seigner and Mathieu Amalric.
      Alone in a Paris theater after a long day of auditioning actresses for the lead role in his new play, writer-director THOMAS (Mathieu Amalric) complains on the phone about the poor caliber of talent he has seen. No actress has what it takes to play his lead female character—a woman who enters into an agreement with her male counterpart to dominate him as her slave. Thomas is about to leave the theater when actress VANDA (Emmanuelle Seigner) bursts in, a whirlwind of erratic—and, it turns out, erotic—energy.
      At first she seems to embody everything Thomas has been lamenting. She is pushy, foul-mouthed, desperate and ill-prepared—or so it seems. But when Thomas finally, reluctantly, agrees to let her try out for the part, he is stunned and captivated by her transformation. Not only is Vanda a perfect fit (even sharing the character’s name), but she apparently has researched the role exhaustively—down to buying props, reading source materials and learning every line by heart. The likeness proves to be much more than skin-deep. As the extended “audition” builds momentum, Thomas moves from attraction to obsession.