First Run Features Announces SPECIAL TREATMENT Screening, 8/15

First Run Features is proud to announce the US premiere of SPECIAL TREATMENT, the darkly erotic drama from cult filmmaker Jeanne labrune.

French star Isabelle Huppert plays a high-class prostitute named Alice who serves up sexual fantasies for her clientele, from schoolgirl innocent to S&M dominatrix. Fed up with the seamy underbelly of French masculinity, Alice crosses paths with Xavier, a neurotic psychoanalyst facing a marriage crisis. The two quickly realize their professions share a thing or two in common as they navigate the overlapping worlds of psychotherapy and sexual therapy.

Director/Writer Jeanne labrune and her writing partner Richard Debuisne started the script as a game comparing the similarities between the two-the discreet locations, exchange of money, time limits, and emotional, physical prohibitions. Labrune says, " In some ways psychoanalysis is to life what prostitution is to love, an interlude, a substitutive experience which works with frustration, need and can create a kind of addiction. In prostitution, the addiction is of a fairly simple nature- achieving pleasure and when the client leaves, he is "satisfied" and, if not, he can change partners each time. In psychoanalysis, things are obviously more complex, for there isn't ever a sense of "satisfaction" at the end of a session. Indeed, it is dissatisfaction which brings the client back to the analyst. This appointment with one's self, via another person, can become an addiction."

Jeanne labrune's filmography includes the feature films: La Part de L'Autre (1985), Of Sand and of Blood (1987), Sans Un Cri (1991), Beware of My Love... (1998), Vatel (screenplay adapted into English by Tom Stoppard for Roland Joffé, 1999), Tomorrow's Another Day (2000), Special Delivery (2002), Cause Toujours! (2004), and Special Treatment (2010).

One of the most respected actresses of her generation, Isabelle Huppert has appeared in over 90 films including Claude Goretta's The Lacemaker (1977); Jean-Luc Godard's Every Man for Himself (1980), where she also played a prostitute; and Maurice Pialat's Loulou (1980). She won a César Award for Best Actress in 1996 for Ceremony, and the Best Actress Award at Cannes Film Festival twice for The Piano Teacher (2001) and for Violette (1978). She is also the most nominated actress for the César Award, with 13 nominations. Huppert has also been a member of the jury at Cannes several times.