THE GIRL CUT IN TWO
aka LA FILLE COUPeE EN DEUX

Year: 2008
USA: IFC Films
UK: Artificial Eye
Cast: Ludivine Sagnier, Benoît Magimel, François Berleand, Mathilda May, Caroline Silhol, Marie Bunel, Valeria Cavalli, Etienne Chicot, Thomas Chabrol, Jean-Marie Winling, Didier Benureau, Edouard Baer, Clemence Bretecher, Charley Fouquet, Hubert Saint-Macary, Alain Bauguil, Emanuel Booz, Stephane Debac, Pierre-François Dumeniaud, Cecile Maistre
Director: Claude Chabrol
Countries: France / Germany
Language: French (English subtitles)
USA: 110 mins
UK: 114 mins
UK Certificate: 15 contains strong sex references and language
USA Release Date: 15 August 2008 (Limited Release - New York and Los Angeles)
UK Release Date: 22 May 2009 (Limited Release)

UK Distributor

Synopsis

Gabrielle Deneige (Ludivine Sagnier) is ambitious TV weather girl and has a high profile job presenting the weather on French TV. Despite Gabrielle's staunch work ethic however, she values her privacy over her professional career and lives in a modest house with her ageing mother (Marie Bunel).

One day, renowned author Charles Saint-Denis (Francois Berleand) is interviewed at the television station where Gabrielle works, and the two feel an instant, powerful connection. Later, at a book signing, the pair continue to flirt despite the presence of a spoiled, ultra-rich, pharmaceutical heir, Paul Gaudens (Benoit Magimel) who openly despises the writer and longs to claim Gabrielle as his own. An unspoken past between the two men increases the tension and their constant demands in their respective relationships with Gabrielle cloud matters leaving her confused.

Despite the fact that Charles is still happily married to his wife of twenty-five years (Valeria Cavalli), with whom he shares a home in a posh ultra-modern estate in the countryside, he and Gabrielle share an intimate afternoon at the author's nearby pied-a-terre. Later, as the potentially psychotic Paul steps up his pursuit of Gabrielle, the young woman begins to question the purity of intention of either of her suitors.

Claude Chabrol returns with the razor-sharp, darkly seductive, A GIRL CUT IN TWO, as the demands on an emotionally confused Gabrielle destabilise her ultimately leading to a shocking clash of violence and passion...

A GIRL CUT IN TWO was inspired by the sensational Gilded Age murder of Madison Square Garden architect Stanford White and written by Claude Chabrol and Cecile Maistre.