When you decide to watch a Catherine Breillat film you have to be prepared for anything. Never one to back away from ideas of female sexuality Breillat as made her mark on the artistic landscape with her books as well as films exploring and exposing ideas about feminine sexuality that have enlightened some while enraging others.

I first became familiar with her work back in 1999 when I saw her film Romance about a sexually frustrated schoolteacher going out to explore and satisfy her sexual appetites in increasingly risky, graphic ways. I remember the controversy at the time because of the full frontal male nudity and vaginal penetration that obviously is not commonplace to non-pornographic film. Needless to say, Romance looks tame when compared to Anatomy of Hell.

Anatomy of Hell, based on Briellat’s own book, is about a woman who, after attempting suicide in a gay nightclub, hires the gay man who saved her life to spend four consecutive nights with her in order to “watch her when she is unwatchable.” First, she performs oral sex on him behind a tree and then she makes him the “watch her” offer. The man, played by famed porn actor Rocco Siffredi, is reluctant at first but then agrees to the deal. All this happens within the first 10 minutes of the movie and sets me up for what I was hoping would be an interesting exploration of ideas. What those were I wasn’t sure yet, but I was very interested in where Breillat was taking me. Then unfortunately the rest of the movie happened and turned into one shocking scene after another without the anticipated ideas. Actually that is not totally true. There were some ideas expressed but mostly in the form of each character spewing monologues about each sex's hatred for the other.

When I say shocking I mean just that, both sexually graphic and otherwise. I have no problem with filmmakers taking things to the limit or even trying to shock an audience, but I do expect some kind of depth of character and script to go along with it. The problem here is Breillat doesn’t give us any of that. Whereas I thought, from the opening, that it was supposed to be about the woman, the film becomes more about the man and him having some kind of realization about women for which he feels such disgust at the beginning of the film. It probably doesn’t help that Rocco, although packing a big cock, isn’t packing much acting ability and comes across like some alien who has never seen a girl before in the way he touches her and stares at her naughty bits. Despite his character being gay, it just doesn’t ring true at all. The way the characters talk to each other, the way their relationship progresses, it all feels like some kind of philosophical discussion that Breillat is trying to have with us, rather than either a film or an actually occurring experience.

What I found the most interesting and at the same time disappointing was an interview I watched with Breillat after I saw the film (it was one of the features on the DVD). In it, she brings up some interesting ideas about her concept of female sexuality and the relationship between the sexes. She talks about what she was trying to say with her movie as well as some of the more graphic and shocking moments. Listening to her talk I thought maybe I hadn’t seen the same movie she was discussing, but I had. That was disappointing because it means that there was a potential to have a very good film but it got lost somewhere along the way.