Dangerous Liaisons

Choderlos de Laclos' decadent 18th-century French novel receives yet another mounting in Josée Dayan's made-for-French-TV miniseries, this time around with the seduction, betrayal, and general mean-spiritedness time-traveling to the 1960s. Better it had remained in the past: the cast is undeniably attractive--Catherine Deneuve as the spiteful Madame de Merteuil, Rupert Everett as the Don Juan-ish Valmont, and Leelee Sobieski and Nastassja Kinski as Valmont's two new targets for conquest--but the overlong production (also available in a three-disc 270-minute version) evokes neither the saucy trashiness to make it tasty cinematic cheese nor the courtly style or ravishing wit to make it simply delicious. Stuck in the indifferent middle, this is a sodden production that thinks it is elegantly spare and is instead merely dull. Optional. [Note: DVD extras include a subtitled 50-minute interview with director Josée Dayan, cast and crew filmographies, behind-the-scenes and production stills photo galleries, a trailer gallery featuring Catherine Deneuve, and trailers. Bottom line: a decent extras package for a disappointing update.] (M. Johanson)