The opening scene of Valmont establishes the film’s entire narrative framework through an elegant epistolary device—a letter being written by Madame de Merteuil to the Vicomte de Valmont that immediately reveals their manipulative, sexually strategic relationship within the corrupt aristocracy of pre-revolutionary France. Rather than beginning with action or exposition, director Milos Forman uses this intimate written correspondence to pull viewers into the intimate inner world of scheming seduction, where words themselves become weapons. The camera follows the physical act of writing while Merteuil’s voice-over addresses Valmont directly, creating a tone of conspiratorial confidentiality that mirrors the letter’s actual contents—requests for sexual conquest that masquerade as witty affection.
This opening choice carries profound implications for the entire film. By framing the story through Merteuil’s correspondence, the narrative grants her interpretive control over events from the start, positioning her as the true architect of the schemes that follow. The letter’s arrival at Valmont’s country estate sets the plot in motion, but more importantly, it establishes that this will be a story told through the prism of aristocratic maneuvering, where seduction functions as currency and social destruction as entertainment.
Table of Contents
- How Valmont’s Opening Scene Introduces the Power Dynamics
- The Visual Language of Merteuil’s Manipulation
- The Epistolary Framework and Narrative Control
- How the Opening Establishes Thematic Territory
- The Practical Effect of Beginning With Merteuil’s Letter
- Historical Positioning and Period Authenticity
- The Mise-en-Scène of Seduction as Art
How Valmont’s Opening Scene Introduces the Power Dynamics
The letter functions as far more than a plot device—it serves as a masterclass in characterization through dialogue. Merteuil writes with the casual cruelty of someone accustomed to wielding social power, making demands of Valmont while simultaneously stroking his ego by appealing to his vanity and reputation. She requests that he seduce the virtuous Madame de Tourvel, a widow known for her marital fidelity and religious devotion, presenting this conquest as both a challenge to his abilities and a personal favor to herself. This immediate establishment of their transactional dynamic—where sexual conquest is commissioned like a piece of art—reveals that unlike traditional seduction narratives, Valmont operates in a world where emotion is performance and authentic desire is almost irrelevant.
The opening also establishes the film’s historical setting with deliberate restraint. Rather than heavy exposition, viewers see the material evidence of aristocratic wealth: the candlelit writing desk, the elegant penmanship, the sealed letter with its wax impression. Forman trusts the audience to understand that this level of leisure, this casual ruthlessness, and this sexual freedom exist only within a specific historical moment—the French aristocracy in its final decades of unquestioned power. The scene avoids explaining this context because the context is embedded in every visual detail.
The Visual Language of Merteuil’s Manipulation
The cinematography of this opening sequence privileges Merteuil’s perspective and agency in ways that become crucial to understanding the entire narrative. As her voice narrates over the letter’s composition, the camera lingers on her hands, her face in candlelight, and the physical space of her writing—establishing her as an active agent of seduction rather than a passive participant. This visual priority matters because it contrasts sharply with how Valmont, despite being the film’s nominal protagonist, receives less direct visual focus in the opening moments.
She is framed as the author, while he is the recipient—a dynamic that reverses conventional gender roles in seduction narratives and signals that Valmont will struggle against her control throughout the film. A significant limitation of this opening approach, however, is that it may obscure Valmont’s own agency for viewers unfamiliar with the source material. By presenting him initially as reactive—responding to Merteuil’s demands—the film risks positioning him as merely a tool in her schemes rather than revealing that he possesses his own ambitions, his own capacity for cruelty, and his own emotional vulnerabilities. The opening scene is deliberately Merteuil’s moment to shine, which serves the narrative brilliantly but requires the audience to gradually discover Valmont’s complexity rather than having it presented upfront.
The Epistolary Framework and Narrative Control
Valmont’s decision to structure its opening through written correspondence draws directly from Choderlos de Laclos’s 1782 epistolary novel of the same name, though Forman’s adaptation compresses and dramatizes the source material significantly. In the original novel, the entire story unfolds through letters between characters, creating a narrative where readers must infer truth from self-interested testimony. Forman’s film adaptation uses this device strategically but selectively—the opening letter establishes the method, but the film ultimately relies more on visual storytelling than on the epistolary form itself.
This choice means that Merteuil’s written words carry particular weight in the opening scene because they represent direct communication, unmediated by the narrator or by visual observation. Her letter is her authentic voice in a way that dialogue might not be, since letters allow for the performance of intimacy without the social constraints of face-to-face interaction. When she addresses Valmont directly in her writing, she is being as honest as such calculating people can be—which is to say, she is being strategically honest, revealing only what serves her purposes while maintaining her ultimate secrets.
How the Opening Establishes Thematic Territory
The opening scene immediately signals that Valmont will explore the corruption of aristocratic society through its approach to sex, power, and human connection. By beginning with a request for conquest rather than with romantic interest or genuine desire, the film establishes that its primary concern is not love but the use of seduction as a tool for social domination. This thematic priority—the transformation of intimate human connection into strategic warfare—distinguishes Valmont from conventional period romances or even from straightforward erotic films.
The scene’s elegant restraint also establishes the film’s aesthetic: luxury as a visual envelope around moral emptiness. Every element of the opening—the candlelight, the fine paper, the aristocratic setting—connotes refinement and beauty, yet the content of the letter is strategically cruel. This tension between surface beauty and spiritual corruption will sustain the entire film, offering viewers the seductive pleasure of watching attractive people in beautiful settings pursue thoroughly unethical goals.
The Practical Effect of Beginning With Merteuil’s Letter
A warning embedded in this opening choice is that it potentially allows viewers to sympathize with Merteuil’s scheming in ways that later developments may not entirely support. By granting her the narrative spotlight, by making her voice-over intimate and witty, and by framing her as the intelligent architect of events, the opening scene creates identification with her perspective. As the film progresses and the consequences of these schemes become more destructive, some viewers may find themselves more sympathetic to Merteuil’s position than the narrative ultimately warrants.
Additionally, the opening’s focus on Merteuil’s written words establishes a sophisticated, almost literary mode of communication that contrasts with the spoken dialogue to follow. This creates a subtle distinction in the film’s register: the written word carries sophistication and authority, while face-to-face interaction often reveals the emotional contradictions and vulnerabilities beneath the aristocratic facade. This technical distinction reinforces the film’s larger argument about the dangers of privileging intellect and strategy over emotional truth.
Historical Positioning and Period Authenticity
The opening scene’s attention to material detail—the specific style of the writing desk, the cut of the clothing visible in the frame, the quality of the light—reflects Forman’s commitment to historical authenticity that extends throughout the film. The early 1980s had seen a wave of prestige period dramas with varying approaches to historical detail; Valmont’s opening announces that this film will take its historical setting seriously.
The letter itself, with its elaborate phrasing and careful calligraphy, represents aristocratic communication as an art form—which it was in the eighteenth century, when written correspondence served as the primary medium of intimate exchange among the upper classes. This historical specificity matters because it anchors the film’s depiction of seduction and manipulation within a particular moment when such behavior, while never morally justified, was at least culturally normalized within aristocratic circles. The opening scene is not condemning these characters for inventing sexual manipulation; rather, it is documenting how their specific historical moment facilitated and even celebrated such behavior.
The Mise-en-Scène of Seduction as Art
Forman’s opening shot places Merteuil at her writing desk, framed in a way that emphasizes the deliberate composition of seduction. The letter she writes is not a spontaneous outpouring of feeling but a carefully crafted document designed to appeal to Valmont’s ego, to trigger his competitiveness, and to place her in the position of puppet master. This visual presentation of seduction-as-craft—as something composed, revised, and perfected rather than something felt—becomes the film’s central preoccupation.
The opening scene teaches viewers to watch not for passion but for strategy, to listen to declarations of desire as potential performance rather than truth. When the letter arrives at Valmont’s estate and he begins reading, the camera moves between Merteuil’s face as she writes and Valmont’s face as he reads, creating visual continuity between sender and receiver that emphasizes their connection as co-conspirators. Yet the spatial separation between them—she in Paris, he in the countryside—also foreshadows the emotional distance that will eventually undermine their partnership. The opening scene establishes their relationship as transactional precisely so that their later conflict becomes genuinely tragic rather than merely the expected outcome of cynicism.
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