White Mischief

Netherlands released, PAL/Region 2 DVD: it WILL NOT play on standard US DVD player. You need multi-region PAL/NTSC DVD player to view it in USA/Canada. LANGUAGES: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), English (Dolby Digital 2.0), Dutch (Subtitles), SYNOPSIS: A millionaire past his prime and his young wife arrive in Kenya circa 1940 to find that the other affluent British expatriates are living large as the homefront gears up for war. They are busy swapping partners, doing drugs, and attending lavish parties and horse races. She begins a torrid affair with one of the bon vivants, and her husband finds out and confronts them. The husband and wife decide to break up peacefully, but the bon vivant is murdered and all the evidence points to the husband. SPECIAL FEATURES: Biographies, Interactive Menu, Photo Gallery, Scene Access, Product Description

British delicacy about some untasty characters

Kenya in 1940 while London is being crushed by German bombs into a mount of rubbles. There the English are leading the most paradisiacal life, so they say, in fact a life that knows no limits, no restraint, no rules, particularly at the sexual level. But an aging aristocrat arrives with his very young and extremely attractive wife. What was to happen happens and all the men who are deprived of a permanent wife want her and she falls in the trap. The rest is aristocratic melodrama with one murder, one trial, two suicides, and a few other unsavoury facts. The interest of the film is in the escapee - and refugee - state of mind of these English that are staying as far away from the war as possible. They are rich and enjoy it. They cannot accept the slightest deception or disappointment. They want everything to go their way without any resistance. They are also totally unaware of and blind to the reality around them. They use pineapples to train their shooting in the most wasteful way. They give financial lessons to their valets, and what lessons: "The banks are ready to lend you an umbrella when the sun is shining but as soon as the rain starts they want it back." This social ombilical egoticism is shown with such precision that it becomes a denunciation of it without any sharp words or hard sentences: just small successive touches in the best British delicate style. The very negative judgment on the British trial of the accused murderer of the lady's first lover is built up with such little details strung one after another without even leading you to any rejection, far from it. The film even builds some feeling of relief when the non-guilty verdict is read, though we know, but forget, that it is not right; just as if to be murdered is a normal and standard risk one man runs and accepts when he tries to seduce the wife of another man. The next interest of the film is of course that we can see this society dying in front of our eyes. One year later it will have to come to an end because the war will demand to be taken care of. Hence we feel the vision is decadent, this society is crumbling and these people are sadly pathetic. The constant nuances introduced in every single scene make this film an extremely enjoyable trip not to paradise but down into hell.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Paris Dauphine & University of Paris I Pantheon-Sorbonne
September 10, 2006

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