Cruel Intentions (Remake of Dangerous Liaisons)

            Choderlos de Laclos’ epistolary novel, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, has been told in a myriad of different cultures and settings. The most linear adaptation is the 1988 Stephen Frears’ film, Dangerous Liaisons, but the story of deception and seduction is probably best known as being set on the cusp of the millennium in New York City under the name of Cruel Intentions. Technically, Cruel Intentions is adapted only from the book but there are many pieces of dialogue that seem to be lifted directly from Christopher Hampton’s Dangerous Liaisons screenplay and the 1999 film is nonetheless, a remake.

            The original story concerns two wealthy, vengeful aristocrats, the Marquise de Merteuil and the Vicomte de Valmont who simper and scheme in18^th century France partly for pleasure, partly for power and partly out of plain boredom. In short, they conspire, and largely succeed in destroying the reputations of two women; a married woman considered to be beyond moral reproach, Madame de Tourvel and a young girl recently engaged, Mademoiselle de Volanges. The calculated events that revoke Tourvel's and Volanges' virtue are orchestrated by the malevolent Merteuil. Valmont enters the picture as the seducer of both women. Beyond that there is plenty of intrigue and high drama trivialities that make up the intricacies in the tale of deceit and defeat.

            Cruel Intentions takes all the details, names included, and plants them amongst the upper echelon of a set of prep school seniors in New York society present day. Changes come to the story in mostly original forms. The director, Roger Kumble, who also adapted the screenplay, did a superb job of updating the story with use of technology and placing some of the original story’s specifics and minutia into modern forms of communication. All of this was done effortlessly and the film manages all of the particulars with ease. All around, the film is a remarkable translation and the integrity of the dishonorable characters holds up.

            The film, in many ways, works very well and tells of all the devious sexual manipulations in a way that is just as fascinating present day as it must have been when the novel debuted in 1782. Largely, the problem with the film is that it lacks the bite of the truer adaptation, Dangerous Liaisons. The devastation of the victims is much more apparent when placed in 18^th century France. Place whatever social commentary on it that you like but the fact of the matter is that women’s virtue is not given as much importance and regard in modern day America. Reputations do not carry the same weight they once did and a loss of one is not the tragedy it once was. The stakes of Cruel Intentions are simply not as high, because of that, it loses the genuinely sweet malice of the story. Watching the machinations carried out by a set of teenagers only reminds the audience that these games are better left to the grown-ups. Baudelaire said when Les Liaisons Dangereuses was first published that it, “burns like ice.” Where Dangerous Liaisons burns, Cruel Intentions only singes.