Bitter Moon

Director Roman Polanski denies that his new film, Bitter Moon, contains any autobiographical elements. Apparently, it's just a coincidence that Peter Coyote's expatriate character comes across as a taller and slightly more demented version of Polanski. It's also just a coincidence that the role of Coyote's French wife, the ever-changing, often kinky Mimi, is played by Polanski s wife, Emmanuelle Seigner. And it's probably just happenstance that Coyote's character is as mentally stuck in Paris as Polanski was, for a while, legally marooned in France. (Is the LAPD still looking for him?)

But then, Bitter Moon has a story that's built as much upon accidents as it is on sex. And most of the film is about sex — good sex, bad sex, wild sex and really bizarre sex. Most of all, it's about two lovers whose mutual passion is based largely on their need to totally humiliate each other. If you're into degradation as a competitive sport, you'll love this movie. If not, you'll find that Bitter Moon is one long drag that (finally) reaches an obvious conclusion.

Hugh Grant and Kristin Scott-Thomas play an English couple who are sailing across the Black Sea on their way to India. They're celebrating their seventh anniver­sary, which is movieland's way of saying that they've become bored with each other. Coyote plays a crippled American who's traveling with his licentious wife, who spends most of her time ogling Grant and dancing to Peggy Lee records. (I can't believe that Polanski had the gall, and was so trite as, to use Fever.)

Coyote, we discover, can no longer satis­fy his wife, so he begins recruiting Grant for the job. His method of persuasion consists of telling Grant the long and windy tale of how their love devolved from passion, to S&M, to (finally) fear and loathing. The truth of Coyote's tale is debatable, but its sordid details are enough to snare Grant in the web of Coyote s obsessions.

It's hard to say "no" to a movie that con­tains such silly lines as, "I'm degrading myself by degrading you," but Bitter Moon is neither enthralling nor (strangely enough, considering the subject) particularly shock­ing. There are a few successful moments of humor, but most of the film plays like a series of boorish confessions