Summary
In the gilded hush of a Belle-Époque antechamber, Louis Martinot—silk-gloved jurisprude and custodian of an ancient name—commissions his confidant Paul Blythe to vet the bloodline of Susanne Bergomat, a soprano-voiced silhouette glimpsed at a soirée. Blythe, moonstruck by the way candlelight pools in her collarbones, forges a calumny: he brands the girl’s mother a can-can relic and her father a tavern oracle of absinthe, then steals her for himself beneath a false flag of pedigree rot. A year of marital frescoes later—marzipan mornings, Venetian mirrors, and the hush of letters never sent—Martinot’s carriage wheels crunch up the gravel, forcing Blythe to stow Susanne in the wings of a Riviera farce starring a geriatric doctor, a runaway train, and a hotel where every door opens onto yesterday’s disguises. When Susanne finally waltzes back into her own story, she is no longer the parchment on which men ink their reputations; she is the ink itself, spilling a burlesque of flirtation and faux-dipsomania that leaves her husband kneeling amid the shards of his deceit. The curtain falls on a kiss sealed with the taste of revenge turned mercy, the aristocracy of the heart usurping the aristocracy of the ledger.
Synopsis
When Louis Martinot, an aristocratic young French lawyer, is called away on business, he asks his friend Paul Blythe to investigate the background of Susanne Bergomat. If her family seems suitable, Paul is to tender a proposal on Louis' behalf. Blythe, after seeing Susanne, finds himself so in love that he proposes to her himself and lies to Martinot that her mother is a cabaret singer and her father a drunkard - a trait that Susanne has inherited. Thus informed, Martinot loses interest, and Blythe marries Susanne, taking her to live in another city. A year later he finds himself in a predicament when Martinot comes to visit. Attempting to hide his wife from his friend, Blythe arranges for Dr. Poulard, an elderly business partner, to take Susanne to visit her parents. After a series of comic misadventures, Martinot meets Susanne in Nice, and upon discovering the contents of Blythe's report, she determines to teach her husband a lesson. Returning home, she feigns a flirtatious drunken spree, which reduces her husband to tears. Finally, Susanne decides that her beloved villain has been punished enough and informs him that her behavior was all a hoax.
Review Excerpt
"
Imagine a world where every whisper ricochets off frescoed ceilings like a duel of rapiers—this is the playground of Her Beloved Villain, a 1920 silent cocktail of champagne malice and gender jujitsu. Director Alexandre Bisson, adapting his own boulevard hit, lets the camera linger on the moment a lie is born: Paul Blythe’s pupils dilate as Susanne’s gloved hand withdraws from his palm, and in that microsecond the film announces its true subject—how desire weaponizes gossip.
The plot—ostensibl..."
