Marquis de Sade: Justine (1969)

Believe it or not, i chose to see this film after i saw Malick's Tree of Life. And i did it not because i wanted something completely different, but because i i was looking for some similarly different approach to film. Make no mistakes. Malick's film changed my life, this is just deliberate and utter trash. But here and there, we have directors filming what they want, away from conventions. Both rely heavily on intuition, in Malick's case supported by a heavy baggage of study and reflexion, in Franco's case, supported only by the pure pleasure of filming, or else filming as a living attitude.Trash films are great, because for a few moments we step outside any convention whatsoever. Sex is a given fact in most of these films, it's called exploitation, because we are supposed to be "exploring" bodies, and sex as voyeurs. I would argue that i don't know where that differs from most of our mainstream these days and for a while now, but that's a different talk. Anyway, what we do have a certain guarantee that, within the production constraints, we'll see what some guy or a reduced number of people wanted to do. That's reassuring.Here we have probably the highest budget of any Franco film, probably that in which he was more constrained, at least in therms of casting. The result is not so visceral, not so crazily hallucinating as some bits of others films can be, but there are some rewarding features:-self-reflective filmmaking: Kinski's character writes the story of both sisters as we go along. So we have a filmmaker making a film about a writer (an imprisoned one) who invents 2 parallel narratives about 2 helpless sisters, who are supposed to mirror 2 distinct postures: one is malicious, the other learns to take pleasure out of humiliation. Justine is the one we follow the most;-in her path along humiliation, intrigue, and all kinds of sexual covet by all kinds of people, Justine walks around a number of sets. Some are forgettable, mere trees in incompetently filmed bushes. Some are just ordinary, some are well chosen places in Barcelona (S.Felipe Neri square is the most seductive of them), and some are Gaudí. This is interesting, because the cinematographers, maybe Franco himself, cared about these sets. Generally speaking, the photography in this film is quite good for what we are used to in these films. In Gaudí's places, there is the intention to film space (notice the highly denounced use of wide angle lenses in some places, to the point of distorting the limits and focus of the image), and, in the parks' scenes, to film the promenade along the several arches. Sex and space, that's a fun and rewarding idea. But Romina Power doesn't have a clue, and all falls to a walk in the park, utterly unrewarding in its biggest promise. My opinion: 2/5http://www.7eyes.wordpress.com

Jess Franco to me, is one of the most evil men in cinema. His films in the 60s were Hitchokian thrillers and a few good erotic ones, however by the 80s he had plummeted into making porn films, fairly crappy at best, compared to Joe D'Amatos Caribbean series. These films consisted of Lina Romay masturbating to sex acts, purely vulgar, Laura Gemser fair enough, but her, no way.Anyhow in the late 60s Franco worked with Harry Allan Towers, and made about 8 damn good films, such as The Bloody Judge, 99 women (less good) and Venus in Furs.However Justine to me, his nemesis, is a good film. It boasts an all star cast, such as Jack Palace, who gives a good performance as a decadant monk, and Klaus Kinski, as De Sade, just prancing around his cell, being taunted by nude phantoms, actually shot using good green lighting and shadow imagery.The film is not do depraved, several nude scenes, some mild sex scenes and some cat fighting, but nothing too bad. Also the buildings, soldiers and extras were fairly epic and in good standard with any epic historical film.The sets were brilliant, hence they were all historical, the film is well shot, cue some blurs etc, well lighted, well cast and well made.Franco is a decent director here, when he worked with Towers, however in the 70s he declined sadly. When he worked with good budgets and actors he was a Ruggero Deodato, but alas, he failed cinema, which he claimed to love...A good film, give it a try!, you will not be disappointed.

Jess Franco's interpretation of the Marquis de Sade's Justine, seems a bit tame for my taste. I really wasn't expecting much going into this (it IS Jess Franco, after all...) so I can't say I was that disappointed. I was expecting a pretty average sleaze film, and that's what I got...Justine and her sister are banished from a private school when their father dies and leaves them no money for tuition. The one sister goes to a whorehouse to work, Justine decides that ain't her thing. The rest of the film is pretty much comprised of Justine being subjected to different forms of exploitation that would have been way worse than what she would have experienced in the whorehouse...Nothing really notable about JUSTINE, other than the beautiful women that show far too little skin. Don't get me wrong - there is nudity in the film - even some brief full-frontal - but it's never long enough or in the right situation to be arousing or memorable. The acting is decent - the sets and costumes are very well done, and the story is relatively entertaining - but it tends to drag. It actually took me three viewings to watch it all the way through, because I kept falling asleep (though I partially blame that on the bourbon...). Not a horrible film, worth a look to exploit fans, just don't expect too much...6/10

Sorry to disappoint, but Justine is by no means the welter of non-stop gore and perversion you might expect from a confluence of Franco, de Sade and producer Harry Alan Towers. Adapted from the Marquis's sublimely immoral 'moral tale,' it plays for much of its length as a bawdy 18th century romp in the style of Tom Jones. Naturally, with the added joys of cut-rate production values and dodgy acting.We only hit familiar Franco territory when our heroine (a bland Romina Power - yes, Tyrone's daughter) is ravished by a coven of depraved monks. Cue for lots of naked Eurotrash starlets, trussed up in chains. Gee, it's good to be home!So Justine is not quite your typical Franco production. For a start, it has something approaching a budget. That means a lot of semi-big names (most of whom have seen better days) show up as 'guest stars.' Indeed, the film is best watched as a vast costume party, whose guests have been invited to Come-As-Your-Most-Embarrassing-Moment.Hence we get Akim Tamiroff as a drunken pimp, Mercedes McCambridge as a lesbian brigand, Sylva Koscina as a cross-dressing noblewoman and Klaus Kinski as the Marquis de Sade himself. The grand prize must go to Jack Palance as Brother Antonin, spiritual leader of the above-mentioned depraved monks. His may be the most deranged performance in the annals of screen acting.Weighed down by the baggage of an international tax-shelter epic, Justine never comes close to the dreamlike delirium of Succubus or Virgin Among the Living Dead or any of Franco's more extreme, smaller-scale works. Still, it's a lot of fun - in its utterly reprehensible way.Franco himself even crops up as the ringmaster of a grotesque peepshow, where Justine is forced to appear after she survives any number of Fates-Worse-Than-Death. Now that's what I call typecasting!