Arthouse discovers the rigours of genre in Reflection in a Dead Diamond (Reflet dans un diamant mort), a vogue-ing pastiche of Bond movies with a bit of Death in Venice. If you like the work of Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani, who have been doing this sort of thing for over 20 years, in films like Amer, The Strange Colour of Your Body’s Tears and Let the Corpses Tan, this will be catnip. Personally, I thought this latest feature – brilliantly assembled though it is – exposed a weak flank. They can make the richest, lushest and most referential movies possibly ever. But can they tell a good story?
They would probably argue that they’re not really trying to, which is fair enough. But for your money you get an opening shot of an old guy sitting on the French Riviera – straw hat, drink by side – whose recollections are kickstarted by the arrival of a pretty young woman by the water’s edge. As she eases herself onto a sunlounger and slips down her bikini top to sunbathe topless, he catches sight of a diamond stud in one of her nipples. And he’s off, in a mad reverie of the life he lived long ago, when he was a James Bond-like spy who had all the girls and gadgets, a ready quip for an assassin, a martini always on the go and a sexy sportscar parked somewhere.
Cattet and Forzani suggest this ancient spy might be losing his mind a bit. His recollection is all jumbled up. Is he still a spy? If not, why is he still wearing a holster? If not why is he eavesdropping on the woman in the hotel room next to his, using gadgets left over from his heyday? Is he still working or just confused?
A story of sorts does eventually take shape from the loose assemblage of images. From the diamonds and tuxedos, the silhouetted dancers and Maurice Binder-esque blocks of colour a recurring character – Serpentik – emerges. A deadly female assassin in black motorbike leathers who appears to be able to change her appearance at will, she is the nemesis of the old misogynist all male superspies tend to be, womanhood in all its faces, races and flavours.
The Italian comic-book master villain Diabolik is the inspiration for Serpentik, say Cattet and Forzani. There’s a good bit of Mario Bava in the overheated look of things, with the old man’s white suit, his fascination with looking and watching, and his elegant standoffishness a nod to Dirk Bogarde in Visconti’s Death in Venice.
It’s Fabio Testi as the old guy. He’s been around a long time and is now in his 80s. A touch stiff in one leg but otherwise looking good, he’s playing an older version of a role he’s played many times before – the handsome cavalier. As the younger John D (the spy’s name) it’s Yannick Renier, while a whole host of women play Serpentik.
Meta is the idea – a meta-assemblage, variations on the theme of the glossy spy thriller. Slightly missing the point that a James Bond movie is already a meta-assemblage playing variations on a theme. But hey. They do it well, luxuriating in the joys of the surface as if postmodernity had just been invented.
Towards the end, throwing raw meat to an audience that’s been maddened by canapés, Cattet and Forzani give us a big belt of female nudity as all the various Serpentiks fight naked. It’s funny but it does raise an issue that’s been troubling this film all the way through. John D, whether old or young, is a bit of a blank. Serpentik is the more interesting character but doesn’t get enough of the action. Maybe that’s always the way – Scaramanger, Goldfinger and Blofeld have all the best tunes. Why, you might ask, are there no female master villains in James Bond?
Reflection in a Dead Diamond – Watch it/buy it at Amazon
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© Steve Morrissey 2026
