MovieChat Forums > Bitter Moon (1994) Discussion > Anyone else hate that scene?

Anyone else hate that scene?

posted 14 years ago by dcampbell000
8 replies | jump to latest

The scene with Mimi and that English dancer. I'm not sure of his name, but all I know is that he was black and had a Cockney accent. He danced with her twice over the course of the film, but the scene I'm referring to is when they had dinner in front of a wheelchair-bound Oscar. There are many reasons why I hate that scene. First of all, he was an English black man in a movie set in France. It's bad enough Nigel and Fiona were English, but it seems completely unnecessary that he'd be an Englishman. A black one at that. Maybe there was an ongoing obsession with the black English singer Seal who became famous around the time the movie came out. The scene makes me hate Mimi to death, and I can't fathom how anyone in their right mind could find her sexy after this scene. She takes the dancer's shirt off right in front of Oscar just to show how delicious his body is. Perhaps, this was done in an effort to emasculate Oscar further. Then, right in front of Oscar, she rubs the guy's crotch. Only an evil bitch should do something like that. Before long, she plays some horrible music and does some seductive dancing with the black Englishman. I hate the black for submitting to her. Moreover, I hated how both Mimi and the black guy had big butts and the fact they kept grabbing at the other's rump. Finally, they have sex with each other and you can hear the sadistically orgasmic reactions of those losers. Nobody mentions this scene as being so depressing as to make you either want to kill that young nymphomaniac and the black man or yourself. This scene gave me nightmares for years after I witnessed it in full detail at fourteen years of age. It doesn't help that the British dancer and Mimi felt each other's butts earlier on in this rather ugly movie. Another minor quibble: why did Oscar's best friend also happen to be another Englishman in a French club that looked much more like an English pub?

[–] lornamd-1 14 years ago

While I don't agree with Mimi's behavior in that scene I didn't hate her for it either. She was doing to Oscar what he had done to her but in a more extreme way.

He made her ill by using her love for him to destroy her emotionally then making her have an abortion when she is too weak to do anything about it then when she is at her illest and frailest abandoning her on a plane believing that she would likely kill herself. He completely destroyed her. She destroyed him by paralyzing him then abusing her position as his nurse. Like I said. It was just the same as what he did but more extreme.

And its the same with the sexual humiliation. He set out to make her feel jealous and inferior by flirting and talking about other women in front of her, calling her ugly and putting her down in public and calling her other womens names while they were having sex. She made him feel jealous and inferior by having sex with another man in front of him.

It wasn't great behavior on her part but he was no innocent victim.

[–] Drooch (5333) 4 years ago

His abuse was sickening but she could (and should) have left him at any time, whereas she deliberately maimed him for life and then devoted herself to humiliating him 24/7.

She’s worse than him.

[–] kelly-527 13 years ago

Sounds like a movie a 14 year old should not have been watching. This is a good example of why movies have ratings. Movies that are acceptable for adults are not always good for kids.

[–] dee_dee333-1 13 years ago

I've read the book but I didn't see the movie yet.
In the book Rebecca (renamed Mimi for the movie) is a poor jewish hairdresser, and she gets humiliated in every possible way after Franz (Oscar) gets tired of her. Actually it looks like in a way he holds her responsible for not coming up with new bedroom experiences. Not only does he hit her, but also gets her drunk and burns her feet with cigarette butts. He brings home other women, while she's there, and has sex with them.
I don't know yet what this movie shows, but in the book, what you described is the least "unfair" thing she ends up doing to him after he's paralysed. She has sex with his 13 year-old son, gets sodomized by some punks she picks up from the street and refuses to wash him for days in a row, leaving him soiled and helpless.

Nevertheless you end up hating both of them equally.

Tell you what I got on my side - the confidence of youth.

[–] meneldil 12 years ago

lol

[–] patrick60924 11 years ago

Somebody got dumped for a black guy?

[–] LeonardPine 9 years ago

You seem to only have problem because he's, A: English and B: Black.

Yer daft racist.

Was it a millionaire who said "Imagine no possessions"?

[–] morganseer 8 years ago

"Anyone else hate that scene?"

I didn't. If I did, I'd have to have a problem with the whole movie. It's a movie about obsession, control, and revenge.

Besides, pretty much everything Mimi dished out to him, he had dished out to her first.

I'm not justifying her behavior. Just saying there were no good guys here. No victims. No innocents. Except maybe for Fiona, and she kind of got fed up with that role and struck back.