HOME |  CULT MOVIES | COMPETITIONS | ADVERTISE |  CONTACT US |  ABOUT US
 
 
 
Newest Reviews
American Fiction
Poor Things
Thunderclap
Zeiram
Legend of the Bat
Party Line
Night Fright
Pacha, Le
Kimi
Assemble Insert
Venus Tear Diamond, The
Promare
Beauty's Evil Roses, The
Free Guy
Huck and Tom's Mississippi Adventure
Rejuvenator, The
Who Fears the Devil?
Guignolo, Le
Batman, The
Land of Many Perfumes
Cat vs. Rat
Tom & Jerry: The Movie
Naked Violence
Joyeuses Pacques
Strangeness, The
How I Became a Superhero
Golden Nun
Incident at Phantom Hill
Winterhawk
Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City
Maigret Sets a Trap
B.N.A.
Hell's Wind Staff, The
Topo Gigio and the Missile War
Battant, Le
Penguin Highway
Cazadore de Demonios
Snatchers
Imperial Swordsman
Foxtrap
   
 
Newest Articles
3 From Arrow Player: Sweet Sugar, Girls Nite Out and Manhattan Baby
Little Cat Feat: Stephen King's Cat's Eye on 4K UHD
La Violence: Dobermann at 25
Serious Comedy: The Wrong Arm of the Law on Blu-ray
DC Showcase: Constantine - The House of Mystery and More on Blu-ray
Monster Fun: Three Monster Tales of Sci-Fi Terror on Blu-ray
State of the 70s: Play for Today Volume 3 on Blu-ray
The Movie Damned: Cursed Films II on Shudder
The Dead of Night: In Cold Blood on Blu-ray
Suave and Sophisticated: The Persuaders! Take 50 on Blu-ray
Your Rules are Really Beginning to Annoy Me: Escape from L.A. on 4K UHD
A Woman's Viewfinder: The Camera is Ours on DVD
Chaplin's Silent Pursuit: Modern Times on Blu-ray
The Ecstasy of Cosmic Boredom: Dark Star on Arrow
A Frosty Reception: South and The Great White Silence on Blu-ray
You'll Never Guess Which is Sammo: Skinny Tiger and Fatty Dragon on Blu-ray
Two Christopher Miles Shorts: The Six-Sided Triangle/Rhythm 'n' Greens on Blu-ray
Not So Permissive: The Lovers! on Blu-ray
Uncomfortable Truths: Three Shorts by Andrea Arnold on MUBI
The Call of Nostalgia: Ghostbusters Afterlife on Blu-ray
Moon Night - Space 1999: Super Space Theater on Blu-ray
Super Sammo: Warriors Two and The Prodigal Son on Blu-ray
Sex vs Violence: In the Realm of the Senses on Blu-ray
What's So Funny About Brit Horror? Vampira and Bloodbath at the House of Death on Arrow
Keeping the Beatles Alive: Get Back
   
 
  Madame Claude Candid Camera
Year: 1977
Director: Just Jaeckin
Stars: Françoise Fabian, Dayle Haddon, Murray Head, Klaus Kinski, Vibeke Knudsen, Maurice Ronet, Robert Webber, Jean Gaven, Andre Falcon, François Perrot, Marc Michel, Roland Bertin, Ed Bishop, Karl Held, Ylva Setterborg, Marie-Christine Deshayes, Max Amyl
Genre: Drama, Sex, ThrillerBuy from Amazon
Rating:  4 (from 1 vote)
Review: The President of the United States (Robert Webber) is having difficulty with international relations when it transpires that a Japanese order for Lockheed missiles from his country has been cancelled, leaving the China Seas open to domination by the Communists. He takes a break from the heated debate and retires to his office, where there is a surprise waiting for him: a call girl who he is so delighted to see that he immediately seduces her. What he does not know is that there has been someone snooping around outside, following the prostitute and taking photographs: he is David Evans (Murray Head), and he is involved with a blackmail ring...

If the presence of Murray Head in the cast leads you to hope for a show with everything but Yul Brynner in Madame Claude, then you'll be disappointed, although while we don't get Yul or everything but, we do get Klaus Kinski as a dodgy and wealthy businessman who always has attractive women hanging off his arms. Director Just Jaeckin was, and still is, best known for Emmanuelle, and it is in that vein that he continued foisting his glossy but vacuous sexual fantasies upon the world. This time he had ambitions to saying something about the double dealings of the men in power in this world, so although we never see the President after the first ten minutes, we do see the effects of his influence.

The Madame Claude of the title is played by that classy French actress Françoise Fabian, cornering the market in such alluring older woman roles during the seventies. It is Claude who is orchestrating the call girl network, providing ladies of the night for the rich and powerful, and offering David a nice line in exploiting the clients by snapping a few pics of them in flagrante delicto. That's not the whole story, however, as André G. Brunelin's script has the attention span of a goldfish, and frequently heads off in other directions, much of them concentrating on Elizabeth (Dayle Haddon), a ne'er-do'well who Claude is intent on taking under her wing.

Indeed, the only way you can recognise that this is all the one story is that the same faces keep turning up throughout, as one scene follows another without much connection to what has happened before. The overall impression is that Jaeckin was out of his depth with the political stuff, because he continually returns to the sexual sequences to reawaken the audience's flagging interest, and these too appear to have been dropped in without much reason other than this is what we expected of him. At one point even Madame Claude's dentist announces that she wants to be one of her prostitutes, completely out of the blue.

Mind you, that scene does illustrate that sex is strictly business for the title character, as she turns down the dentist because she thinks she would enjoy herself too much. Sex is not something to be enjoyed for what it is for her, it has to be a step on the way to getting what you want, so she has no interest in, say, allowing Elizabeth to fall in love with Kinski's son after the businessman hires Elizabeth for a weekend in the Caribbean: a harsh lesson for the novice. If you can follow the convolutions of the plot, you should be able to catch on that David is getting in over his (Murray) head with these shady figures looking for his negatives, just as Elizabeth is out of her depth when she cannot be as coldhearted as the sex trade demands. At a late stage, the film turns into a thriller, with a typically cynical seventies ending; although the most cult interest might stem from the Serge Gainsbourg soundtrack, which includes Jane Birkin singing too.
Reviewer: Graeme Clark

 

This review has been viewed 8379 time(s).

As a member you could Rate this film

 
Review Comments (2)


Untitled 1

Login
  Username:
 
  Password:
 
   
 
Forgotten your details? Enter email address in Username box and click Reminder. Your details will be emailed to you.
   

Latest Poll
Which star probably has psychic powers?
Laurence Fishburne
Nicolas Cage
Anya Taylor-Joy
Patrick Stewart
Sissy Spacek
Michelle Yeoh
Aubrey Plaza
Tom Cruise
Beatrice Dalle
Michael Ironside
   
 
   

Recent Visitors
Enoch Sneed
Darren Jones
Mark Le Surf-hall
  Louise Hackett
Andrew Pragasam
Mary Sibley
Graeme Clark
  Desbris M
   

 

Last Updated: