Mauvais Sang

Director: Leos Carax

1986 / 116min / DCP

A genre-bending explosion of pure cinematic effervescence pairing Binoche and Denis Lavant, both at the beginnings of storied careers. Binoche plays the gamine mistress of a superannuated Paris gangster (Michel Piccoli), while Lavant stars as a street hustler who becomes ensorcelled of her, with his propulsive, thrashing dance/sprint set to David Bowie’s “Modern Love” surely one of the most exhilarating passages in all of French cinema. Equally indebted to the rebellious spirit of the Nouvelle Vague and the swooning romanticism of Frank Borzage, Carax’s film pits young love against venal age, with a stolen virus hanging in the balance—the relevance to the then-raging AIDS crisis is not coincidental.

Distributor: Janus Films

Part of Juliette Binoche Emotion in Motion