Belle Epoque

www.movieposter.com

A colleague and friend recommended this to me, perhaps because I told him I had enjoyed Vicky Cristina Barcelona.

The movie to compare it too, I thought, was Y Ti Mama Tambien. Both are in the soft porn/erotic mode, but Belle Epoque knows what genre it's in—the traditional fabliaux—and executes it well. We believe in the characters’ innocence; the Penelope Cruz character is a real ingénue who we care for. We care for everyone. All the characters are attractive, to the point of corniness, and I didn’t mind whatever corniness was there.