Showing @ Filmhouse, Edinburgh until Thu 29 Mar

Declan Donnellan / UK/France/Italy / 2012 / 102 mins

“Sleeping your way to the top” may still exist today, but generally, it’s a lifelessly corny topic for film to explore. Perhaps not the worst film ever made, but a close contender, Declan Donnellan’s adaptation of Guy de Maupassant’s eponymous 1885 novel is an indulgent, ludicrous waste of time and money. It tells of Georges Duroy (vampire boy Robert Pattinson), a “journalist” who climbs the social ladder by sleeping around with the wives of influential male elites at the turn of the 20th century. Naturally, it’s all in English, despite it being set in Paris…

The whole point of Maupassant’s novel was to expose the weakening political infrastructure as it courted the media and flirted with high society; in Donnellan’s film, this takes a back seat as we’re privy to Pattinson wooing left, right and centre. Christina Ricci is the first to be seduced as she pays for a ‘love nest’ where they can cop off together; Uma Thurman is next as the hard-to-get mature widow; finally Kristin Scott Thomas falls under his boyish spell as the super-mature woman. It’s impossible to find anything redeemable about this film: an embarrassing script, laughable performances, uninspired casting, zero development and more shots of Pattinson’s smug face than should be legally permitted. This review comes with a warning: do not see this film.