A Perfect Enemy is an adaptation of the successful novel Cosmétique de l'ennemi , published in 2001 by the renowned Belgian writer Amélie Nothomb. The writer has written more than forty works, including novels, short stories and plays. I have not read the novel, so I can't say how accurate the adaptation is, but the book has good reviews, besides having all the elements and resources of the writer. Many of her novels deal with characters who discover the dark side of the human being, with a biting writing and the use of black humor, plus it is a constant that they are always a couple of characters interacting with each other. I noticed all that in the film, so I can say, without having read the novel, that the spirit of the work is maintained in the film.

What is the plot of A Perfect Enemy?

Successful architect Jeremiasz Angust finishes giving a lecture in Paris, he must go to the airport as quickly as possible, so as not to miss his flight. It is a rainy afternoon in Paris and when the cab driver takes him to the airport, a strange girl named Texel Textor, who is also going to the airport, asks him to take her in the vehicle. Unfortunately, Angust does not arrive in time for the flight and must wait several hours at the airport, of which he was one of the architects twenty years earlier, to catch the next flight. The girl will approach him again inside the facilities starting a conversation, Angust does not feel like talking, but what Texel Textor will tell him, will be more and more strange and absurd, also assures that he committed a crime. A conversation, where we will be shown events of the past and that each time will increase the tension between the two, until an unhinged and dark ending, where all the pieces of the conversation will fit perfectly. Who is this Texel Textor? Is what he says real? Has he killed someone? And what the hell does Angust have to do in all this?

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The two characters in the film maintain their interactions in a single space, the airport. That infrastructure, which was designed by Angust, plays an important role in the whole story, not only as a spatio-temporal place where the narrative develops, it is also the key to the whole story, it is not just an airport, it represents something more personal for the architect.

Nothing is by chance, that this girl asked him for help when she was going to the airport, has an explanation. At first it can be difficult to get into the game of the story, the first half hour we don't know where the story is going. Who is this woman? Why does she tell such absurd things? Viewers suspect she has something to do with the architect, but what? They don't seem to have anything in common, she is very young and there is nothing to connect them.

Sometimes she seems to want to seduce him, but he is not interested. He wears a wedding ring, apparently he was married and has not been able to forget his wife. The girl is pretty, attractive and young, but he has no interest in her. It seems to bother him that the girl wants to engage him in conversation and won't leave him alone inside the airport.

The impertinent girl doesn't stop, she keeps bothering him and each time the story she tells about her life has dark undertones. Apparently, she has committed a crime. The architect will be intrigued, he will want to know a little more, although what the girl tells, seem absurd inventions, there is something disturbing in the facts she narrates.

Soon everything will take a really dark path, it is in the third act of the film, when the pieces of the puzzle fit together. The whole story that Texel tells makes sense and with a twist that will surprise the viewer. Reality, fiction, madness, everything is mixed in the final minutes, when we discover what one of the characters is hiding.

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It is a psychological thriller where two totally opposite people engage in a verbal fight, one of them a successful businessman, famous architect, wealthy and with an ideal life, although he shows great sadness because apparently his wife has left him and does not know where he is. He still keeps the ring on his finger, although he has not seen her for twenty years. The other person is a young girl, extroverted, with a strange name, with a difficult childhood, she does not seem to be a successful person or related to the world of the architect.

But she will take control of the conversation, especially when she tells the architect how she arrived in Paris and that she fell in love with a girl, a love at first sight that made her commit madness. The girl seems to have lived on the edge and the murder she committed will trigger madness in Angust.

The movie is the interaction of these only characters, there are other characters that appear in the story, which are part of flashbacks. But as I have researched, the book is also like this, two people talking. This may not please some viewers, who want to see a movie with more dynamism, but I assure you that the movie has a good pace, even though it is two people talking in an airport, the director is agile in handling the pace, besides duly inserting the scenes from the past of the characters.
For me it was fun to see the play of powers of both, plus the character of the girl is very magnetic, is attractive and the story he tells is interesting, for the absurd moments and for the macabre moments, because in the end it is a disturbing story, with an ending that surprises.

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**The film was screened at the last Sitges Film Festival in the Official Competition Feature Film Section,**where it was well received. Most of the reviews were positive, although there is a group of specialists who don't seem to like the film at all. I understand the negative reviews, we have to be honest and it is not the director's best film. There is a lot of narration, when a movie should show. But you have to understand that the book is a constant narration of two characters, it was difficult to escape from the context of the original work.

To adapt the novel, the director himself along with two other screenwriters, Cristina Clemente and Fernando Navarro, had the difficult task of translating those words into cinematic language, but it was difficult to detach from the narrative. It is not the filmmaker's best work, but I found it interesting enough as a psychological thriller, and at no time did I find it boring.

The setting in a single scene, the airport, offers us a very striking cinematography work, which was in charge of Rita Noriega, a successful Spanish cinematographer. There is a remarkable contrast between the photography inside the airport, with that captured in the scenes of a rainy Paris and the flashbacks throughout the story. Rita Noriga had already worked on a short film with the director, in addition to having a career that includes documentaries, TV series and films, among the most recent, is the film Secret Origins, which I reviewed a few months ago.

Alex Baranowski, a London-based composer, scored the film, accentuating the film's moments of tension and suspense. This composer's career spans many short films, series and some feature films. He was nominated for a Tony Award for best sound design for a play.

The characters

Tomasz Kot plays the architect Jeremiasz Angust, the successful man who will miss the flight to help a stranger, who in the end will have important revelations. The Polish actor is magnificent in his role. He is an actor who captivated me in Pawel Pawlikowski's Cold War, a film I recommend everyone to see. Not only that, but also the previous film by director Pawlikowski, a Polish filmmaker who has become one of my favorites. The actor is well known in his country, having worked in more than thirty plays, numerous films and several successful TV series. He is a celebrity in his country.

Athena Strates plays Texel Textor, the mysterious girl who initiates the conversation with the architect by asking him the question: Have you killed someone? She is the one I liked the most of the performances, her character has a disturbing element, we know she is hiding something, and she will surprise us when the end comes. She is an actress I didn't know, among her previous works are her roles in Genius: Picasso, The Good Liar and Aufbruch ins Ungewisse and Die Nachtschwestern. I think this actress has potential, especially for creating sinister characters, hopefully she will be offered more work in the future.

There is a third character, very important in the plot. She is played by Rodrigo Sorogoyen's partner, Marta Nieto, a famous Spanish actress who was nominated for a Goya for Madre, directed by Sorogoyen. This actress reminds me of a movie I saw some time ago, called Combustión. Attention to her character who is very important to close the story.

Trailer

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