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Reviews
Los ritos sexuales del diablo (1982)
It's all a bit of a dream
Once more using very nice location photography (this time in England) we have another amateurish Euro porn horror movie. Horror in this case is just an excuse to show uninteresting ritualised sex. Along the way we have a touch of incest and the suggestion that it is all a premonition revealed to the heroine in a dream.
There are, very very dim, echoes of Rosemary's baby - except there is no actual baby.
All in all a dim film.
Felicia's Journey (1999)
Where's the end
Starts very promisingly then ends nowhere. a big disappointment after "The Adjuster", "Exotica" and "The Sweet Hereafter". Bob Hoskins should really leave the accents alone. He's a London boy and that's all he can do.
Best bits are the first part of the film which is very atmospheric, the excellent use of Birmingham locations which are just as awful as in the film and Felicia, who is lovely. The cookery scenes aren't bad either.
Hitchcock would have shown us behind the locked door. I suspect that Egoyen did not know what we would find.
Bitter Moon (1992)
Loved the red dress
Bitter Moon is a good bad film. One of those movies where you cannot tell whether the acting and story are good or really bad. In a funny way this makes it all very watchable although there are several strikes against Roman Polanski for putting his wife Emanuelle Seigner through her paces in a variety of sex positions and humiliations. This comes from the Nick Roeg/Theresa Russell school of film making.
Excellent is Seigner who is beautiful in a very "Betty Blue" French sort of way. Kristen Scott Thomas is also in it and she is of course attractive in an English sort of way which is not quite the same thing.
If this review seems sex obsessed it's because the movie is but it's also very funny. Peter Coyote is great once he gets in a wheelchair. He should get an oscar for his Gauloise smoking alone. Hugh Grant on the other hand should be shot for his gibbering performance.
Romance (1999)
Yes but there are a couple of laughs as well
A lot has been written about this film. In England, the first surprise we get is when our heroine clamps her mouth around her boyfriend's penis. All this in a mainstream film.
Yes it is turgid in places but there are moments I liked. It is affecting when she becomes upset at the bondage session. However, like a naughty child she comes back for more. I thought the sight of the old seducer rooting in his box of tricks for the sort of equipment a plumber might use then cursing when he does not have enough handcuffs and ankle irons very funny scenes.
Other good bits? Well I like what happens to her boyfriend. He deserves all he gets. Also the final scene is excellent even if it does seem to have strayed in from another movie.
Le roi et l'oiseau (1980)
About time this animation was re-released.
The King and Mr Bird, as it was known in England makes most Disney output seem poor in comparison. It is actually stitched together using an old forties (I think) animation called "The Shepherdess and the Chimney Sweep" and modern footage.
It is the modern stuff which gives it the edge as we are whisked through the Kingdom of Tachycardia, a futuristic city run by a vain king. Mr Bird is a symbol of freedom who brings anarchy to the kingdom.
Best bits. All of it but the ride in the lift is recommended as well as the scenes with the giant robot.
La comtesse noire (1973)
much ado about nothing
Lina Romay spends most of the film wandering around dressed in a)a long open cloak, knee high boots and very wide boots b)a large see through net curtain c)nothing at all.
The story is she is last of the Karstein line and vamps her male and female victims using oral sex instead of the usual blood and fangs, although there are various more conventional alternative versions of this film to get round the censor. Anyhow she finally meets the man of her dreams and then spoils it all by sucking him dry.
Mostly dreary soft porn as Romay nuzzles the groins of her co-stars and then thrusts her own up to the camera. Best bits? The cheesy Euro score, the shots of the moving car bonnet with the flying bat symbol which actually flaps its wings and Romay wandering through the mist shrouded forests clad only in her cloak etc.
Le frisson des vampires (1971)
An oddity
Absolutely true to say that it has no story but the combination of pretty nude vampires and photography, coupled with the muddled story give it a certain charm. Watch out for the purple eyed vampiress who emerges from a clock then from a chimney. See her kill her victim with a pair of pointed breasts.
Also look out for the two old male vampires who wear crushed velvet loon pants. I especially liked the end where the vampires dies with cheesy special effects and our demented hero is firing his gun into the air as he runs along the beach.