Inside Beatrice Dalle

When I wrote this review of Inside I found out some interesting things about Beatrice Dalle, the actor who played the killer. I knew she looked familiar and with a the help of the IMDb I found out I recognized her from Jim Jarmusch's Night on Earth where she played a blind taxi passenger. I also learned that Brodie Dalle, former lead singer of The Distillers and ex-wife of Rancid frontman Tim Armstrong, took her stage name as a tribute to Dalle's performance in the film Betty Blue. It also turns out that when she's not getting homicidal with a pair of scissors, Beatrice Dalle is smokin' hot.

I tracked down a copy of Betty Blue and while I didn't exactly love it, it's not hard to imagine a teenage punk rock girl obsessing over it. It's about an undiscovered writer and his insane girlfriend smoking, drinking and having sex until she finally goes completely nuts and he sells his novel. Add in a mime and a striped shirt/beret combo and you've got pretty much exactly what people who have never seen a French film probably imagine French films to be. That includes sex and nudity. Lots and lots of sex and nudity. So much sex and nudity that there are some scenes where it's not entirely clear if you're watching acting or the real thing.

It turns out that Beatrice Dalle is no stranger to horror movies. She also starred in Funny Games director Michael Hanneke's post-apocalyptic thriller Time of the Wolf and alongside Vincent Gallo in the cannibalism movie Trouble Every Day, both of which I'll be tracking down for a review soon. She was also M. Night Shyamalan's original choice to play Bruce Willis's wife in The Sixth Sense but was denied a visa because of her arrest for cocaine possession while filming an Abel Ferrara film in Miami.

I'll leave you with a clip from Betty Blue. It's a bit long, but at least check out the first minute or so. Granted, Betty Blue came out in 1986 and Dalle has moved more into MILF territory, but as far as hot slashers go, she's got my vote. Sorry Pamela Vorhees.