The Sentiment of the Flesh (2010) User Reviews (7)

Medical Fetish Drama

[Armin_Nikkhah_Shirazi · 5/10 · 16 March 2022]

THE SENTIMENT OF THE FLESH chronicles the stormy, kinky relationship between a gifted medical illustration student and a radiologist.

Going into the movie without any foreknowledge, my impression during the earlier parts was that of a more or less routine steamy romance, but in a medical setting. When curious romantic musings appeared about wanting to see everything of a loved one, including their insides, I dismissed it as the kind of bizarre philosophical connection only the French can pull off.

But then, it became clear that this was really a film about an unhealthy obsession with a potentially dangerous fetish. Yet even that realization did not prepare me for the grotesque ending, which would seem to be more at home in the horror genre.

This type of movie has been done before, and much better, albeit in other settings (see the list at the end). For one thing, the dramatic build-up to the grand finale was not developed well enough. The movie is relatively short, so there would have been room for intermediate fetish sequences to lead more smoothly into the extreme finale. The intensity of the movie stayed about the same up to the ending, which made both the movie less exciting and the final act more jarring.

I found the motivation of the characters in some scenes hard to follow. One moment, they don't want to see you, the next they want to become almost literally one with you or put their life into your hands. It was very hard for me to make sense out of all this, and the result was that I could not relate to the characters. This is a big problem for a film that introduces the audience to an unusual kink through its protagonists.

As an art-house love story it may have an audience, but this is definitely only for people who dig this kind of stuff.

Better movies with similar elements are:

1. IN THE REALM OF THE SENSES (1976)

2. CRASH (1996)

2. THE PIANO TEACHER (2001)

Going Further Until a Disgusting Absurd Ending

[claudio_carvalho · 1/10 · 8 March 2014]

Héléna Onelli (Annabelle Hettmann) is an intern of Medical Illustration in anatomical drawing in a hospital and obsessed by the human body and internal organs. She complains of pain on her back and is submitted to X-Rays by the radiologist and professor Benoît Govion (Thibault Vinçon) that does not find anything wrong with her. Their mutual interest in human anatomy leads them to a love affair based on sex. Héléna asks Benoît to go further in his exploration of her body and the lovers have no limits in their intercourse. Héléna continues to complain of pain on her back and Benoit examines her with the MRI machine and does not find anything wrong with Héléna. However, she wants him to explore her internally and Benoit breaks up with Héléna afraid of how far he could go in his curiosity and exploration.

"Le sentiment de la chair", a.k.a. "The Sentiment of the Flesh" is an erotic romance with a great chemistry between the gorgeous and hot Annabelle Hettmann, who is unknown in Brazil, and Thibault Vinçon. After a promising beginning, the author and director Roberto Garzelli is completely lost and does not know how to develop the story of obsession for anatomy of the two lovers. The disgusting conclusion spoils what could have been a reasonable romance. My question to the author is how insane would be a radiologist and professor to operate like a surgeon, without anesthetist or nurse, and bury his mouth in the flesh of the patient? My vote is one.

Title (Brazil): Not Available

interesting topic spoiled by ridiculous story details

[jclarke2 · 19 August 2011]

Psychopathology and sexuality. OK. Yes, an attractive young man and woman have an intense sexual relationship based on, guess what? ... anatomy. She's an artist, he's a radiologist. No surprises so far. The errors in the medical details make this film painfully amateurish for anyone familiar with hospital practice. A few examples: The radiologist is actually taking the plain films, alone. This is about as likely as the bank manager being at the teller's window. The radiologist does an MRI on the girl, again, alone. Where does he get the contrast? How does he think nobody will see the images, since they are all on the computer? The machines don't work until all of the patient information is entered, etc. (Billing, you know.) The coup de grâce for silliness (not to mention disgust) is when he gives her a spinal anesthetic and opens her abdomen, again, alone, and buries his face in her lower abdomen or pelvis, filling her peritoneum with virulent organisms from his mouth. She can't be enjoying it since there are no sensory nerves to speak of inside of that area, and she has a spinal. Really silly. The French make some wonderful films. This is not one of them.

Decent Screenplay Reduced to Cheesy, B-Movie at End

[fanball8 · 3/10 · 9 August 2011]

Héléna, who is pursuing a degree in anatomical drawing meets Benoît, a radiologist and professor, when she sees him for X-rays after complaining of lower back pain. Their mutual interest in human anatomy draws them into an intense relationship where they explore each others bodies in unconventional ways. Héléna has a photographic memory, and and uses it to create detailed drawings of the human body and its internal organs. Benoît develops a fetish-like obsession with the human skeleton and internal organs while working with X-ray and MRI images. The MRI imagery even becomes an art medium to him, stimulating his fetish.

After no cause for the back pain is found on Héléna's X-rays, Benoît offers to examine her with the MRI machine. Héléna agrees, and Benoît's insatiable curiosity about the internal details of Héléna's body leads to increasingly dangerous acts of exploration.

Héléna (Annabelle Hettmann) and Benoît (Thibault Vinçon), are a fairly attractive young couple with good on-screen chemistry. The directing and camera work were good. The screenplay was good enough to hold my interest, but with a major flaw. There is a dramatic plot twist about half way through that is inexplicable to me. I watched the movie all the way through twice, and I can only conclude that the writer wanted to insert some drama, without being too concerned about developing it plausibly. The subtitles contained many incorrect translations. However, the translation errors didn't affect the meaning significantly, and may just be a result of the translator taking liberties.

The writer went for extreme shock, in a morbid way for the ending. I think this was overdone, and a decent storyline was instantly reduced to cheesy, laughable, B-movie status.

Dull and Disgusting

[kenjha · 1/10 · 26 December 2012]

A female art student and a male radiologist discover that they share a fascination for certain body parts - those that are inside the body. This is an unbelievably dull movie. There is hardly any plot. The only point of the movie is that the two main characters are obsessed with internal organs. They talk about the organs endlessly. The man then gets off by doing an MRI on her and lusting after her organs. This works for a while but then looking at pictures of her organs is not satisfying enough for either of them. Hence, it is taken to the next step where he must touch her organs...and the film takes a turn from merely boring to disgusting.

Love inside out

[kosmasp · 7/10 · 13 July 2022]

No pun intended - but you will understand by the end of it. You may not want to be eating... in or out, while you watch the movie (again no pun intended). The characters in this are weird to say the least - but they do have some sense. At least the male character seems to at some point in time. But the attraction may be too much.

I reckon the end is something that the movie does build up to. Not sure if it is as shocking as you may imagine it. I would argue, that if it leaves you cold ... well you have watched a lot of movies and are aware this is only a movie. You can distance yourself from that then. I have respect for that. Good for you.

Everyone else: be prepared - for something shocking. Something you may even call disgusting I assume. You have been warned about this slow burner.

If you must watch it, just skip to the ending

[abdulx · 1/10 · 4 January 2013]

I'm sure there are people out there who fantasize about internal organs its not a far fetched idea given the sick world we live in, there is no point to this movie, the ending actually is the best part because it pretty much summarizes the whole movie. So do yourself a favor and just skip to the very last 3 minutes or so, where you are treated to a scene of a man operating on his lover while she's awake, he cuts her open and then he proceeds to bury his face into her open flesh, licking her insides and begins his orgasmic Internal organ fetish, while she lovingly rubs his head and encourages him.

This scene explains to you the whole movie which is pure and simple, Internal Organs sexual Fetish between two people.

Oh yes, he also gets off to MRI scans of internal organs at some point in the movie.