Secret Things opens with naked erotic dancer Nathalie (Coralie Revel) mixing masturbation with contemporary dance for a sophisticated audience. It’s a surprising first five minutes and sets the tone and direction for the rest of the film.

When Nathalie and barmaid Sandrine (Sabrina Seyvecou) are sacked from their jobs in a strip club, they join forces to undermine the male controlled society that dictates their future.

Nathalie offers Sandrine a place to stay and within the first 15 minutes of their friendship she has already given her a crash course in self-pleasure.

Nathalie’s war cry is to tantalise, seduce and flatter her prey until she gets what she wants. And, contrary to her behaviour, that isn’t a relationship with another woman, but a rich, successful man.

She expertly tutors the naïve Sandrine in her philosophy – cue multiple scenes of the two girls bringing each other off. For instance, while waiting for a metro on their way to a job interview the girls remove their underwear and sneak into the tunnel for a quick grope, knowing they’re being watched by the men behind the surveillance cameras.

The girls find jobs for the same company and plot the seduction of three co-workers.

Sandrine starts with Cadene (Olivier Soler), 35, single and desperate for a wife. She moves on to her immediate boss, Delacroix (Roger Mirmont), who’s never indulged himself with an affair, and then peaks with the good-looking heir to the company fortune, Christophe (Fabrice Deville).

Nathalie, however, is curiously closed lipped about her progress.

Sandrine works her way up the corporate ladder by offering the prospect of sex to her superiors without actually delivering it. One night Delacroix realises how much she enjoys her overtime when he catches her – you guessed it – masturbating. He offers her a helping hand and her promotion is set.

But the girls bite off more than they can chew when they eventually catch Christophe’s eye. He’s a sexual sadist who prefers to spend his wedding night with his sister and the local swingers – and I don’t mean dancing – more than his new bride. His allure is so ardent and his rejection so vicious that repudiated women have been known to set themselves on fire at his feet.

Jokes aside, Secret Things flips from being deliciously twisted to distastefully psychotic.

Christophe spouts existential mumbo-jumbo to justify his immorality and director Jean-Claude Brisseau has over-indulged himself with other director’s fantasies – namely Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut and the whole of Peter Greenaway’s back catalogue.

It must have passed Brisseau by that women have been using sexual power since Eve tempted Adam with her Golden Delicious. But this biting observation of sexual manipulation and office politics - with no obvious morals - is as good excuse as any to make arty erotica.

The French take all this sort of thing extremely seriously and Secret Things is enjoyable and often sensual, but pretentious fluff nonetheless.

Despite the over abundance of girl on girl frolics, Secret Things is primarily a film aimed at voyeurs and masturbating men who like to watch women touch each other. But by the climax all the smug straight men who’ve snuck away from their wives for a secret wank will leave the cinema deflated wondering why women love bastards so much.

Secret Things is released in the UK on 22 July 2005

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