Entertainment

Stylish take on fairy tale is to kill for

French director Catherine Breillat is noted for pushing the sexual envelope in films such as “Romance” (the sex was real) and “Anatomy of Hell” (the sex might have been real).

Her new creation, “Bluebeard,” is as erotic as anything she’s done, although sex is more suggested than acted out — smoldering like a volcano ready to erupt.

The film’s teenage protagonists, Marie-Catherine and Anne (played respectively by Lola Créton and Daphne Baiwir) are meant to be a dirty old man’s fantasy. They’re trusting (or so it seems), virginal — perfect targets for the notorious Bluebeard (Dominique Thomas).

Based on Charles Perrault’s grisly 1697 fairy tale about a nobleman who kills his wives, “Bluebeard” gets a new spin by Breillat.

Her story switches between the 1950s, when two young sisters sneak off into the attic to read “Bluebeard,” and the 17th century.

In the latter tale, Marie-Catherine and Anne are students at a Catholic convent school — until they’re kicked out because their father has died, leaving no money for tuition.

“Our Lord in his infinite kindness has chosen to suddenly recall your father,” the heartless Mother Superior tells the girls, as if their dad were a defective Toyota.

God’s “infinite kindness” doesn’t include letting the bereaved girls stay in school, or even letting them say goodbye to friends. They must leave immediately.

It’s not too long before a Bluebeard associate comes a-calling on the girls and their mother. Since Bluebeard is wealthy and Marie-Catherine is without funds (her father left only debts, and the family’s belongings are repossessed almost before the body is cold), she agrees to become the much older gentleman’s child bride.

But there is to be no sex before she’s 20. That’s probably for the best, because Bluebeard is so corpulent that he’d crush his fragile bride.

On their wedding night, Bluebeard offers his bride a cot at the foot of his bed.

She rejects the sleeping arrangement, insisting on her own room — one so small that the overweight bridegroom is unable to fit through the door. Later that night, she sneaks down the hall to spy on her husband as he undresses.

“Bluebeard” revisits themes often found in Breillat’s films — sibling rivalry, pedophilia, gender conflict — but it remains fresh and new.

The direction is stylish, the acting buoyant and the cinematography, by Vilko Filac, scrumptious.

vam@nypost.com