Anyone who enjoyed Denys Arcand's Cannes winner The Barbarian Invasions will be eager to eyeball this 1986 prequel. Where the new movie is preoccupied with death, this one is obsessed with sex - not so much the physical business, you understand, but as a topic of conversation. A detailed, drawn-out conversation in fact, ticking off everything from STDs to Marx's maid-shagging antics.
Arcand sails through 97 dialogue-based minutes, nipping nimbly between his male/female quartets of French-Canadian academics. And Decline amuses rather than affects, leaving its follow-up to achieve a more satisfying balance. That said, few films find such eloquent entertainment in non-stop smut.
DVD Extras:
Just a trailer and filmographies.
