Madame Bovary

Directed by Claude Chabrol, this 1991 French drama adapts Gustave Flaubert's 1857 novel of the same name. Set in Normandy in the 1850s, it follows Emma Bovary, a young and attractive woman full of romantic dreams, who marries the unexciting country doctor Charles Bovary. Once the initial charm of marriage fades, Emma searches for new excitement and drifts into adulterous affairs, while her taste for a luxurious lifestyle pulls her ever deeper into debt, leading toward tragedy. Isabelle Huppert stars as Emma, with Jean-François Balmer as Charles Bovary and Christophe Malavoy as Rodolphe Boulanger. Chabrol, who also wrote the screenplay, claimed he staged the film as Flaubert himself might have shot it had he held a camera instead of a pen. The film earned a Golden Globe nomination for Best Foreign Language Film and an Academy Award nomination for Best Costume Design, while Huppert won Best Actress at the Moscow International Film Festival.