Diagonaldi Very well executed

Dorathen Better Late Then Never

Lollivan It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Zlatica One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

lazarillo While this is no masterpiece, the many negative comments here are rather perplexing. This is a French film about two foreigners living in Paris, an Australian woman who is quite literally a "drama queen" (she's a theatrical understudy having an affair with her director who happens to be married to the actress she's the understudy for) and a stoic, elderly Chinese man with painful memories of his youth during WWII. Their friendship has a care-giving element(on his part) and an erotic element (on her part). They are too far separated by age and culture to have any kind of conventional romantic relationship, yet they still create a kind of symbiotic but destructive dynamic that lonely and desperate lovers often do.I'm sure neither actor speaks French perfectly, but since they are PLAYING foreigners I don't know why that is a big problem. James Hong who plays the Chinese man is a veteran character actor who handles his character quite well and gives him a quiet tragic depth that is only slowly revealed over the whole course of the film. Leelee Sobieski is a little more problematic. Her self-destructive character is a little ill-defined in the first place, and she has the same problem here she had later in the "Turn of the Screw" adaptation "In a Dark Place": She's tackling a very erotic role here, but she often seems inhibited and uncomfortable (i.e. she has a long but rather innocuous nude scene at one point, but she also rather implausibly keeps her clothes on during all her many sex scenes). She's not exactly in her element here obviously, but she is used better here than she was in her Hollywood films like "Never Been Kissed" where she plays a stunning beauty. . . uh, I mean a gawky loser who can't get a date. God knows, this is better that THAT movie and other crap she was in like "The Glass House".This is certainly not your typical French movie. At one point the Sobieski character gets in trouble with her neighbors (shades from Polanski's "The Tenant") for having sex too loudly. Judging how the beautiful people in French films typically act, you'd think she'd get in trouble for not having sex loudly ENOUGH. And aside from Sobieski and her married lover, most of the people in this movie are actually pretty physically unattractive, certainly not what you'd expect from a FRENCH film. This is an unconventional and interesting film.

TheAnimalMother This is a film about human relationships and loneliness, reaching out and healing. It is not your typical old man seduces young beauty that you may expect. It is a thoughtful and introspective film. I think more than anything the title L'idole, or The Idol, is meant to revolve around the James Hong character. In that everyone in the building in which he lives respects him, and when a young and beautiful new tenant played wonderfully by Leelee Sobieski comes into the picture. He is the only one who finds a real meaningful connection with her. Therefore the rest of the building's tenants also become somewhat envious of him in their own emptiness of depth-less or stale relationships as he and the new beauty grow closer. Perhaps even some viewers will be envious of the graceful and experienced Hong character, and I think that is part of the point. I guess you could twist around the idol idea, and say that Sobieski is the idolized one in certain ways. Nonetheless, loneliness and disconnect are major themes here. Pretty much every character seems to struggle with anything that would resemble a deep or truly meaningful relationship. All in all, L'idole is an intriguing watch as both James Hong and Leelee Sobieski are hard to not watch, as they easily out act the average Hollywood standards. The supporting cast also fits very well here, helping to make this a quality piece of character driven film.7.5/10

Anthony Youell I never really expect to enjoy French films anymore than I would think that I would enjoy escargot or frog legs. However, I did. I took the film out on DVD and consequently had the facility to go back over the film when I felt that I "didn't get it".If you're looking for an action film, forget it. "I'm not that kind of film" it would say. The appeal in the film is generated by the very human tensions that exist between the characters, and not just between Sarah Silver (Leelee Sobieski) and Mr Zao (James Hong, whose acting career goes back to "Love is a Many Splendoured Thing" 1955). There is an interlacing of frustration, suspicion, jealousy, spite, anger, futility, despair, and villainy. Overlaying all of this is the sexual tension which is never consummated, nor is ever likely to be, between Sarah and Zao, which endows the film with a sense of foreboding. There is a feeling of imminent disaster. The disaster, however, manifests itself in a direction not anticipated when the lead actress, Sylvia Martin, whose place Sarah wanted to supplant, suffers fatal injuries. The effect on Sarah who had placed a so-called hex on Martin is to change Sarah's life.One of the most intriguing aspects of the film was in the character of Caroline (Maria Loboda) who looks like Emmanuelle Beart. A girl who hovers around the aging Zao and relies on him to feed her birds, and who should be the very embodiment of innocence, is riddled with jealousy (for the 'artiste'), malevolence (her interception of Sarah's parting letter is truly spiteful), and greed - which nearly results in her death when she hungrily snatches up the poisoned cake.Zao is also complex. A man who has suffered the atrocities of the Japanese invasion of China and suffers from the bitterness which resulted from his slaughtered child(ren), kindly succours Sarah who is clearly not looking after herself. But he prepares a lethal cake with Sarah's sleeping pills which he had formerly substituted with rice grains, when she tried to commit suicide, after she rejected him. She rejected him because he had frustrated her melodramatic moment of suicide.Other characters are well drawn too. The thieving neighbour Castellac who tells Zao that if Zao needs him, he's there to help - as he filches Zao's bottle of wine. Suffering from lack of recognition in his retirement (he was a uniformed railway guard) his sexual frustration is partially assuaged by listening over the landing to Sarah's orgasmic cries which, in turn, lead to the intrigue of the 'petition' from the residents.The entire film is shot in shadows and darkness to match the dark motives of the denizens. The film began and ended with the motif of the roller-skaters which brought the film to a pinpoint in time. Nothing was different despite the fatality, sexual assault, and murderous intentions.One criticism: Leelee's Australian accent wasn't!

caspian1978 Your typical American audience will salivate over a movie like L'Idol. For the simple reason of nudity and sexual overtones, truck loads of fans will pile up and wait in line to see a movie like this. Leelee Sobieski has tempted her fan base for years to star in an "art house" picture like this one. Her natural beauty has kept her a popular actress since the start of her career. The French / Polish actress has fooled around with doing swim suit moments in the Glass House and cover up jobs in the NBC movie Uprising. Now, the world gets to see some brief nudity from an actress who has millions of fans who want to see her "show all." But, the movie hasn't been picked up in America?! Two years later, a movie that should have made millions at the video stores hasn't even stepped foot in the U.S. L'Idol is considered your typical French film where sex is always the setting. Although this movie is not about sex, most of your typical French films has the hidden background of sexual struggle between characters throughout the movie. L'Idol has been greatly over looked and should be on the American video store shelves as soon as possible.