Welcome to New York

In May 2011, French politician/former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn was arrested in Manhattan after allegedly sexually forcing himself on a Guinean housekeeper, Nafissatou Diallo, at the Sofitel Hotel. Director Abel Ferrara's Welcome to New York offers a fictionalized account (with changed names) of that notoriously sordid scandal. Financier George Deveraux (Gerard Depardieu) relishes his uninhibited, over-privileged, hedonistic lifestyle. During his one-night stay at a New York hotel, Deveraux enjoys the carnal company of several prostitutes--before pressing himself, naked, on a chambermaid (Pamela Afesi) in his suite. Then it's off to a lavish lunch with his daughter (Marie Mouté), where he orders bouillabaisse, joking that the seafood dish is “like a sex party with the fishes.” Later that day, while boarding a plane to Paris, Deveraux is arrested, interrogated, and incarcerated. What comes next is home detention at a $60,000/month Tribeca townhouse, paid for by Deveraux's furious, long-suffering spouse (Jacqueline Bisset), the latter clearly modeled on Strauss-Kahn's then-wife, ambitious French-American socialite heiress/journalist Anne Sinclair. While criminal charges were eventually dropped, a subsequent civil trial ended in an undisclosed settlement payment. More restrained than many of Ferrara's films (such as Bad Lieutenant), this is a strong optional purchase. (S. Granger)