During one of her avant-garde theater performances, Colette notices that her ex-husband Willy, Gauthier-Villars, is in the audience, prompting her to reminisce about her development from ingenue in rural Burgundy to novelist in Paris. It follows Colette's life in her twenties and thirties, her marriage to libertine Willy, her relationship with, the younger, yet well-experienced actress Polaire, and the publication of her first novels under Willy's name.
Caricature of Willy, Colette and Polaire by illustrator Sem (c.1910)
The film was released in New York City on November 6, 1992.[3]
Reception
Joe Leydon of Variety gave the film a negative review and wrote, "Not even a twinkly eyed, scene-stealing turn by Klaus Maria Brandauer is enough to enliven Danny Huston's Becoming Colette ..."[4]
Peter Rainer of the Los Angeles Times also gave the film a negative review and wrote, "The film, which was directed by Danny Huston and scripted by Ruth Graham, has an airless, disembodied quality—not exactly what one wants from a movie about a sensualist of genius."[5]
Rita Kempley of The Washington Post also gave the film a negative review, describing it as "negligible".[6]
References
^ ab"Colette". BFI Collections Search. British Film Institute. Retrieved 14 September 2024.
^Canby, Vincent (November 6, 1992). "The Making of a French Literary Legend". The New York Times. Retrieved February 12, 2023. The film, which opens today at the Sutton, is not quite a nonstop scream but, in its determinedly flatfooted way, it's as saucy a piece of movie baggage as has turned up in two or three decades.
^Leydon, Joe (May 12, 1992). "Becoming Colette". Variety. Retrieved February 12, 2023.
