Diary of a Nymphomaniac Review

The Diary of a Nymphomaniac is about a young French woman, Valérie Tasso (Belén Fabra ) and how her sexual escapades led her to self discovery and understanding the purpose of life. Marie Tasso (Geraldine Chaplin), her grandmother brought her up. With a baby boomer like perspective on life and sex, which is unusual for someone in her old age, the same grandmother encourages Val (as she is fondly called) to scribble her thoughts and experiences in a diary. Encouraging promiscuity in a subtle manner; Marie narrates how she regrets not having to experience sleeping with anyone else other than her husband when she was younger.

That conversation between grandmother and granddaughter along with numerous bed scenes in the movie did not disappoint me. It was sexual as I expected it to be. It was the title which made me curious about it and prompted me to watch the film to begin with. Aside from carnal scenes and ideas, I was also expecting the movie to hide behind social issues to mask a pornographic theme like most films of the same flavor do. There were social issues of course, such as how women fall prey to prostitution (pimps included) due to unemployment and underemployment. How single mothers will do anything just to feed their kids. How death and poverty are on opposite ends of a death bed. So you lose, whichever side you decide to stand by with. In this movie, the latter is depicted through a friend Val met in a brothel she had worked in the latter part of the movie. The friend dies, killed.

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The chapter where Val worked in the club seems to redeem the movie from everything it lacked or had too much of. It’s already obvious that the film discusses nymphomaniac behavior and so you can actually fast forward all erotic scenes. Doing so, you’ll miss Leonardo Sbaraglia who plays Jaime on the film though. I would have guessed there’s something wrong with his character right from the start. Mr. Perfect with a great career and money is not at all perfect indeed. Prematurely ejaculating, he does not satisfy our beloved nymph’s sexual needs.

It would have been a happy ending if the Jaime chapter turned out well. The nymph would have been contented with one man alone in a marriage setup. Ironically, Val went through a painful experience in an earlier part of the movie with another man who had left her to marry someone else. It was supposed to be her redemption from being considered only for sex and not for marriage. It was not a happy ending of course.

The Movie's Achievements

The film had been acclaimed all over Europe. It had been praised for its music, its artistry, and the sheer boldness of depicting what is taboo for most. The cast and crew shared the spotlight as well. Even Fabra had gained a following after the movie’s release.

The Movie Summarized

Eliminating elements of the movie: 95 minutes of playing time filled with eroticism, social issues masking a sexually explicit content, European artistic ingenuity expressed in film, and popular cast (Sbaraglia and Chaplin) adding weight will lead me to one conclusion alone. It doesn’t matter that it was supposedly written based on a nymph’s psychologically disturbed perspective but the whole movie can be summarized in Val’s realization that sex drive makes different individuals the same. Sex is a common denominator between marriage and prostitution. Sex is neither evil nor good.

Conclusion

Released in 2008 with director Christian Molina, this Spanish film had been nominated in 2009 at the Gaudí Award for three categories Best Film Editing, Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role, and Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for Belén Fabra.

Further Notes:

This would have been one of those I’ve written and forgotten. I saw it on one of the old folders while emptying my computer’s memory from unnecessary files. It was supposedly for the blog www.thefilmelitist.wordpress.com but the med students behind the blog are currently too busy to update it so the post ended up here.