Watch This on DVD: "Dangerous Liaisons"

I had never really watched this Oscar-nominated 1988 adaptation of the play based on an 18th-century French novel, but the production's quite engaging even if the plot basically boils down to "pre-Revolution French aristocrats behaving badly."  As for whether they ultimately get away with it, you'll have to see the film.

Glenn Close is excellent as the scheming, heartless marquise who thinks nothing of destroying lives and reputations for her own personal entertainment, and John Malkovich is a riveting and subtly underplayed anti-hero, the notoriously depraved nobleman who plays the marquise's deadly games with her when not pursuing his own goal: seducing a noblewoman famed for her virtue (Michelle Pfeiffer) just to see if he can.  Amusing bonus: Uma Thurman and Keanu Reeves looking impossibly young.  Great costuming too for everyone, even as it highlights the corruption under all that elegance and sophistication.  Here's the trailer, which itself is a lot of fun, especially at the end.

"I have this appalling reputation."