leoperu It's hard to believe that no reviewer connects Bonello's (inferior) movie with the novel "Yama" ("The Pit") by the lesser - though still great - Russian realist Alexandr I. Kuprin ; even the "original" ending is pure Kuprin transferred to more distant future : times are getting worse, brothels closing, impoverished madams packing... soon the facade of the house changes completely, and all those girls named so and so run their own way lost in a big city, becoming a new kind of prostitutes : lonely street nomads .... Watching "L'Apollonide" I tried in vain to be entertained or swept by it, to like the "Nights in White Satin" gimmick, or the brutal visualizing of the " tears of sperm" metaphor, or the sequence of the mutilation structured a la Nichols'"Catch-22".

khsu First the bad: I found the relationships among the girls and between the madam and the girls to be somewhat one-dimensional and strain credibility. Bonello seemed to want to downplay any conflict in order to emphasize 'sisterhood,' but I found it hard to believe everyone for the most part got along with everyone else and seemed to look out for one another - especially a bunch of women. All the women/girls just seemed generally so 'nice,' spiritually pure, and well-intentioned. The sense of community was idealized and aestheticized to the point where some important, more nuanced aspects of reality were lost.The ending was also kind of odd. The girls in the house were high-class courtesans with a mostly affluent customer base. Wasn't that a point Bonello was trying to make? And yet in the end they were paralleled with modern-day streetwalkers. It's not like street prostitutes didn't exist back in the day either, but the house girls were different. They're highly trained from a young age - not to fulfill just men's physical needs, but mental and emotional ones as well. High-roller escorts exist today too, and if anything, they would probably be more like them today, than streetwalkers. It's strange Bonello in the closing scenes decided to upend what he just spent the last 2 hours describing.I think these are two significant flaws of the work.The good: The Woman Who Laughs was no doubt the 'center' of the film that was trying very hard to be 'centerless,' Flowers of Shanghai-ish. Which was not necessarily a bad thing, as I found her story to be very interesting and moving. Especially in the scene toward the end when she cried the 'tears of sperm' - extremely imaginative, poignant, and profound - and reminded me why I started to watch Bonello's films in the first place after watching Tiresia. I think that moment alone is worth the admission.Tiresia was nearly flawless throughout and worked as a whole. I didn't really like The Pornographer or On War. Was it just a fluke, a flash of genius? Bonello is still a young director, with only a few full features under his belt, so I would like to wait and see what else he can do.

George Gates Here's what you need to know. - Film: looks like crap and looks to be analog in times of RED, Canon 5D/7D, Arri and Phantom camera systems. See "Drive", la casa muda,Celda 211, and Nokas for what that translates to - Cinematography: OK, nothing outstanding, novel or revolutionary, no noteworthy scenes whatsoever (noteworthy: e.g. jumping through window scene in "Ajeosso") - all-out artsy director, which automatically precludes a liking of a majority audience - boring dialogue / no characters to relate to - some intentional scares, just for the sake of selling the movie. - there is no great storyline.NOTHING HAPPENS IN THIS FLICK! In other words no scenes have any subtle meaning which is referenced, resolved and intertwined with later parts of the movie - and let's face it, with 100.000 feature films released each year you don't want to invest your viewing time in mediocrity.Thankfully I turned off after 40minutesVerdict: Avoid

cherryredpinup I loved this film, I am surprised to see more than one review damning the film for a lack of plot. There is most definitely a plot it's subtle and thoughtful but the characters all have an arc and, for some, very definite resolutions. The cast are superb, even those with the smallest roles present fully rounded individuals of whom it's possible to infer their lives outside the bounded world presented to us. The relationships between the women of the house both amongst themselves and with their clients are rich and true. Although full of sex and sexuality nothing is gratuitous or titillating but real and honest. Sometimes good, sometimes dreadful, sometimes funny, sometimes a violation. This was a film that I would have been happy to watch for another two hours , I didn't want to leave these women behind.