This could possibly be the greatest film ever made!!!
It was criminally, barbarically received coolly by both critics and audiences when released - for no apparent reason!!
Many reviews have said up to the half-way point, it is as good as any hitchcock thriller; but from there it goes downhill.
Speaking on behalf of the male population, this is where it picks up from the greatest film hitchcock never made to a surreal masterpiece!
The reason for this, of course is the introduction of Roman Polanski's real life wife - Emmanuelle Seigner. She is surely one of the most hypnotic, mysterious actresses ever to grace the screen.
She has a raw, down to earth beauty, which fits in perfectly with the film's setting - The Paris underground: airport hangers, parking lots, alleys and seedy nightclubs.
Never has Paris been shown in this light.
The film perfectly shows the disillusionment of a stranger in a foreign place.
The film also has a few nice touches which might be missed by a casual viewer, such as Harrison Ford's characters increasingly pathetic returns to his hotel as he grows increasingly "frantic". At the beginning of the film he is a respected doctor, but as Paris begins to take its toll on him he ends up a shoeless, crazed mess followed everywhere by a drug-crazed punkette.
All in all, Polanski's definitive film and a mega-hit that never was.
