Cruel Intentions

Cruel Intentions is a 1999 American teen romantic drama film written and directed by Roger Kumble and starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe, Reese Witherspoon, and Selma Blair. The film is an adaptation of the novel "Les Liaisons dangereuses", written by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos in 1782, but set among wealthy teenagers attending high school in New York City instead of 18th-century France. In a 2016 interview, Sarah Michelle Gellar revealed that the original title of the movie was to be “Cruel Inventions”.
The film started as a smaller budget independent film, but was picked up by Columbia Pictures and released on March 5, 1999. Despite mixed critical reviews, the performances of Gellar, Philippe, and Witherspoon were praised. "Cruel Intentions" was a box office success, earning $76 million and spawning two further films, both direct-to-video.
Plot.
In an upscale New York City mansion, wealthy and popular teenager Kathryn Merteuil discusses her prep school with Mrs. Caldwell and her daughter, Cecile. Kathryn promises Mrs. Caldwell that she will look out for the naive Cecile. When Kathryn's stepbrother Sebastian Valmont enters the room, Mrs. Caldwell reacts to him coldly and leaves with Cecile.
Kathryn tells Sebastian that she intends to use Cecile to take revenge on her ex-lover Court Reynolds, who dumped her for Cecile. Kathryn asks Sebastian to seduce Cecile, thereby spoiling her in Court's eyes. Sebastian refuses because he is planning to seduce Annette Hargrove, the headmaster's virgin daughter, who has published an essay in support of chastity until marriage.
After some negotiation, they agree on a wager: if Sebastian fails to seduce Annette, Kathryn gets Sebastian's vintage Jaguar XK140; if he succeeds, Kathryn will have sex with him, suggesting possibility of anal as well, since Kathryn is the only girl Sebastian has failed to bed.
Sebastian's first attempt to seduce Annette fails, as she already knows about his bad reputation. Sebastian discovers that Mrs. Caldwell, Cecile's mother, warned Annette about him. He finally agrees to corrupt Cecile out of revenge.
Meanwhile, Cecile confides in Kathryn about her romance with her older music teacher, Ronald Clifford. Kathryn reveals the romance to Mrs. Caldwell, who orders Cecile to end the relationship, her disapproval arising out of his race. Sebastian lures Cecile to his house, offering a letter from Ronald. He then gets Cecile drunk and blackmails her in order to trick her into allowing him to perform oral sex on her. The next day, Cecile confides in Kathryn, who advises her to be as promiscuous as possible to learn how to please Ronald.
Sebastian begins to truly fall in love with Annette, who returns his feelings but is still hesitant. Sebastian calls her a hypocrite because although she claims to be waiting for her one true love, she resists him when he chooses to love her back. Annette finally relents. But Sebastian, confused about his own feelings, now refuses her. Annette flees to the estate of her friend's parents. Sebastian finds her and professes his love, and they consummate their relationship.
Kathryn offers herself to Sebastian after he wins the 'bet', but he rejects her, because he now only wants Annette, which leaves Kathryn enraged and jealous. Sebastian informs her that he was planning to tell Annette the truth. Kathryn warns him that doing so will destroy both his and Annette's reputations. Sebastian lies to Annette, claiming he just wanted to see what she was like in bed, and that he has no real feelings for her. Devastated, Annette tells him to leave.
Sebastian informs Kathryn that he has broken up with Annette and now wants his reward for winning the bet. Kathryn reveals that he, and not Annette, was the true victim of her scheme: for her own amusement, she manipulated him into abandoning Annette once she realized that he truly loved her. She then dismisses him, telling him that she doesn't sleep with "losers".
Sebastian desperately tries to contact Annette to confess the truth and beg for a second chance, but she refuses to see him. He gives her his journal, in which he has detailed Kathryn's manipulative schemes, their bet, and his true feelings for Annette.
Ronald starts a fist fight with Sebastian after Kathryn tells him that Sebastian hit her and violated Cecile. Annette tries to intervene, but is thrown into traffic; Sebastian is hit by a taxi when he pushes her to safety. Before dying, Sebastian confesses his love for her and Annette tells him she loves him, too. Ronald, now remorseful after realizing he was manipulated, kneels in the street with Annette to tend to a dying Sebastian.
In her eulogy at Sebastian's funeral, Kathryn says she tried to set an example for her late brother. When people start leaving midway through her speech, Kathryn rushes outside to find Cecile handing out copies of Sebastian's journal. As the details of her manipulations and drug abuse are made public, Kathryn's reputation is finally destroyed. Ronald also writes a detailed confession in how she lied to him about Cecile not being a virgin and how she lied to him about Sebastian hitting her. It is implied that the disapproving headmaster will expel her from the school.
In the final scene, Annette drives away in Sebastian's car with his journal at her side, remembering the good moments they shared together.
Production.
One of the filming locations was Old Westbury Gardens in Nassau County, New York, as well as the Harry F. Sinclair House in New York City.
Reception.
The film received mixed reviews from critics. Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a score of 55%, based on reviews from 115 critics, with an average score of 5.3/10. The site's consensus stated: "This darkly comic drama and its attractive young cast are easy on the eyes, but uneven performances and an uninspired script conspire to foil "Cruel Intentions."" Metacritic gave the film an average score of 56% based on reviews from 24 critics. Charles Taylor of "Salon.com" described the film as "The dirtiest-minded American movie in recent memory - and an honestly corrupt entertaining picture is never anything to sneeze at." Stephen Holden of "The New York Times" stated, "You have the queasy sense that the whole thing is just an elaborate stunt and, in this case, an exploitative one." Despite this, Roger Ebert, a noted film critic for "The Chicago Sun-Times," praised "Cruel Intentions" and gave the film three out of four stars in his review, stating that it was "smart and merciless in the tradition of the original story." "Cruel Intentions" was a commercial success, grossing $13,020,565 in its opening weekend, ranking #2 behind "Analyze This"; released in 2,312 theaters, the movie raked in $76.3 worldwide against a $10.5 million budget.
The movie was nominated for Worst Remake at the 1999 Stinkers Bad Movie Awards, but lost to "The Haunting".
Awards.
The film received the following awards and nominations:
Soundtrack.
The "Cruel Intentions" soundtrack is a compilation soundtrack released on March 9, 1999 by Arista/Virgin Records. It reached number 60 on the Billboard chart. The lead track for the film was "Bitter Sweet Symphony" by rock band The Verve.
Prequel and sequel.
The film received two direct-to-video follow-ups—a prequel titled "Cruel Intentions 2" in 2001 and a sequel titled "Cruel Intentions 3" in 2004. Written and directed by Roger Kumble, "Cruel Intentions 2" was assembled from "Manchester Prep," a scrapped prequel series by Fox, of which three episodes had been filmed. It features younger versions of the characters of Sebastian Valmont and Kathryn Merteuil played by Robin Dunne and Amy Adams, alongside Sarah Thompson and Keri Lynn Pratt. "Cruel Intentions 3" was directed by Scott Ziehl and features Kerr Smith, Kristina Anapau, Nathan Wetherington, Melissa Yvonne Lewis, Natalie Ramsey and Tom Parker.
Cancelled television series.
NBC announced in October 2015 that they had picked up a television pilot for a continuation of the film's storyline, which was to be written by Kumble, Jordan Ross and Lindsey Rosin, with Sebastian Valmont and Annette Hargrove's son being the main character. In February 2016, Taylor John Smith and Samantha Logan were cast, with Smith playing the male lead role of Bash Casey, Sebastian Valmont and Annette Hargrove's son. Gellar reached a deal with producers to reprise her role as the female lead, Kathryn Merteuil. In March, Kate Levering was cast in the role of Annette Hargrove. On October 31, 2016, NBC announced that they decided not to go through with the series.
Musical.
"" is a 1990s jukebox musical also by Ross, Rosin and Kumble, based on the film. After two runs in Los Angeles and a pop-up engagement in New York, the show made its Off-Broadway debut at the Greenwich Village nightclub Le Poisson Rouge in November 2017 and ran through April 2018. Set to pop and rock hits of the 1990s and songs from the film's soundtrack, the plot concern the manipulations of Sebastian Valmont and Kathryn Merteuil. The diabolical step-siblings place a bet on whether or not Sebastian can deflower their incoming headmaster's daughter, Annette Hargrove.