Curiosa

Curiosa is a French historical drama set in Paris in the 1890s, loosely drawn from the lives of the writers Pierre Louÿs and Marie de Régnier. Marie de Heredia marries the poet Henri de Régnier to settle her father's debts, even though her feelings belong to Pierre Louÿs, her husband's closest friend and a poet with a taste for erotic photography and travel. What follows is a sensual triangle in which literature, photography and desire become entangled, and the conventional rules of the era are set aside. The film takes its visual cue from the erotic photography of the late nineteenth century.

Lou Jeunet directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Raphaëlle Desplechin; Olivier Delbosc and Serge Hayat produced. Noémie Merlant plays Marie, Niels Schneider is Pierre Louÿs and Benjamin Lavernhe is Henri de Régnier, with Camélia Jordana as Zohra Ben Brahim and Amira Casar and Scali Delpeyrat as Marie's parents.

Released in April 2019 and running 107 minutes, the film has drawn modest audience scores: 5.4 out of 10 on IMDb from roughly 4,900 votes, and 5.8 out of 10 on TMDB from about 254 votes. The smaller TMDB sample rates it slightly higher, but both figures point to a restrained reception rather than a broad consensus.