Roman Polanski’s 1992 erotic thriller Bitter Moon — French title Lunes de fiel, a pun on honeymoon — puts a tired British couple, Nigel and Fiona, on a cruise where they listen to failed writer Oscar tell how he and his young wife Mimi went from obsession to mutual ruin. Oscar is already disabled when they meet him on the ship. The film is not a BDSM consent manual. It is a cruel loop about love turning into hate and power flipping with the body.
The ship is on the Mediterranean toward Istanbul. Nigel meets the young French woman Mimi at the bar; Oscar invites him into their cabin. Oscar is acerbic and used up. He describes meeting Mimi on a Paris bus and falling into obsession. As he talks, the core of their relationship comes out: bondage, sadomasochism, voyeurism, public humiliation. Nigel is hooked on Mimi. Fiona flirts with a younger man in the bar and warns that anything he can do, she can do better. That outsider pressure sets up the later shifts.
Oscar and Mimi’s power reverses hard. At first Oscar dominates — sadistic fantasies, public humiliation, forcing an abortion when she gets pregnant because he would be a terrible father. Visiting her in hospital he almost softens, promises a Caribbean holiday, then gets off the plane before takeoff and leaves Mimi crying alone. Two years later, drunk, he steps in front of a vehicle. Mimi visits the hospital, shakes his hand, then yanks him out of bed into the traction gear and leaves him paraplegic. That revenge puts her on top. She enjoys humiliating him and seducing other men in front of him. He wants to die; she gives him a gun for his birthday. After the wreckage they decide they need each other and marry.
The New Year’s party on the ship is the end. Nigel clumsily courts Mimi while Oscar coaches. In the storm Fiona dances with Mimi and they kiss; the room cheers. Nigel finds Fiona naked asleep beside Mimi in Oscar’s cabin; Oscar says the women have had sex. Nigel grabs Oscar’s throat; Oscar points the gun; Nigel backs off. Oscar shoots the sleeping Mimi twice, then kills himself. As the bodies leave the ship, a shaken Nigel and Fiona hold each other. Mr Singh sends his little daughter to comfort them.
Europe got the film in 1992; North America in 1994. It failed commercially. Reviews split: Derek Elley in Variety said Polanski was at rock bottom; Janet Maslin said he is never dull; Roger Ebert praised a director who does not compromise — you could hear a pin drop. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 63%; Metacritic at 62. For kink viewers the value is the fiction of SM as mutual destruction: Paris bus to the traction-frame reversal, birthday pistol, New Year’s double corpse. Power exchange drives the plot. It is not a how-to.
