The second collection of films begins with an interesting satirical work called Dogtooth a film made in Greece with English subtitles and which contains scenes suggesting a detached sexual relationship between an adult teenage brother and sister. These two and their younger sister have been raised entirely at home within the grounds of the family home because the parents want to protect them from the realities and corruption of the outside world.
The father leaves the household for work as a manager/owner of a factory complex and arranges all the food and other family needs for the outside world to be met. It is assumed that when professional building and maintenance work has been required the children were kept in isolation until the work is completed.
Mother is primarily responsible for the education of the children and keeps in contact with her husband through a secret telephone. She also has a secret radio. There is a television but the family only watch selected videos in English without subtitles so the parents interpret what is being shown to suit their philosophy.
The film reveals that the children have been taught that the overhead flying planes are the actual size of toys which the parents sometimes give to the children as presents for some achievement claiming that the toys have been real planes which sometimes fall from the sky.
The second belief is the fish they eat originate in their outside swimming pool. The fish are placed in the pool without the children knowing and are then fished for.
The third fostered belief is that cats are vicious creatures that will attack and devour human beings so they must be avoided and if necessary killed if they stray onto the grounds when the secured front gate is opened.
Father has arranged for a dog to be professionally trained and the children are prepared for its arrival being told that their mother will give birth shortly to another child and a dog. They mother will only give birth to the dog if the behaviour of the children improves.
The main focus of the film is the relationship between the son and a female employee of the father who works as a security guard at his factory. He brings her blindfolded home on a regular basis to have clinical sex for which she is paid. She is allowed to have meals with the family and sometimes stays for a while with the sisters before being driven to her home. However she has been briefed not to provide any information which will destroy the illusions about the outside world held by the children.
Bored by the detached sexual act with the son, the visitor persuades one of the daughters to provide oral sex without the girl understanding what she is doing. She is given a headband with stones which are said to light up in the dark. She then gives her sister the headband in exchange for being licked on arm!
The good order of the home becomes dramatically disturbed when one of the daughters blackmails the visitor into giving her two videos in her possession which she views secretly in the middle of the night. These have a profound affect on her behaviour: Jaws and a Ricky film. When she uses the word zombie from one of the films her mother says these are yellow flowers so when a buttercup appears she tells her mother zombies have arrived.
However he turns violent on her brother which leads to the father discovering the involvement of the visitor in the provision of the videos. This leads to father murdering the young woman who lives on her own bashing her head in with a video player. It is then decided that the son will have sex with on of the daughter. He is blindfolded and told to fondle the daughters in bath to select one to be his partner for intercourse. He selects the older and during intercourse it is evident the girl is unhappy at being used in this way; She knocks out one of her Dogsteeth hence the title of the film She gets into the boot of her father’s car. In the morning the family are upset to find the daughter missing. He searches for her. The son and other daughter console each other and kiss. Father drives to work. The girl is left in the boot, apparently unable to get out. The film ends. Make of all this you will!
Sex appears to be at the core of the Danish film Antichrist which I found depressing and incomprehensible yet according to Dr Mark Kermode who introduced the Film Four Extreme season of films most of which I missed this is a major film. The film shocked audiences because of an opening sequence where penetrative intercourse between married adults is shown in close up.
While this is happening their preschool child has opened his bedroom window and is amazed with the falling snow and which is covering the ground. He stretches out to catch the snow and falls to his death. His mother never recovers.
In the first part of the film Chapter one called Grief she moves to an establishment for therapy after failing to respond to psychiatric drugs. The sequence ends with a vision, dream, hallucination in which her husband encounters a dear without fear of him and then he finds a dead fawn in hanging from the womb.
Chapter two is Pain and fear, panic and grief overwhelm the woman. The husband is also the subject of frightening and unpleasant experiences encountering a disembowelling fox which utters “chaos reigns“.
Chapter three is Despair. She wants him to beat her. During sex in the woods roots turn to hands emerging from the soil. The child appears to have had deformed feet at the time of its death and husband finds photos of the child wearing boots on the wrong feet. He becomes even more concerned about the behaviour past and present of his wife, she crushes his testicles.
Chapter four the Three Beggars. Husband asks if his wife wants to kill him. She says not yet, but when the Three beggars arrive someone must die. There is a flashback to the prologue in which she sees what a child is doing and does not act to prevent his fall. She mutilates herself while masturbating. She attempts to kill her husband but he strangles her instead and burns her body on a funeral pyre.
There is an epilogue in which he is returning to cabin eating berries. From the top of the hill he sees he blurred faces if hundreds of women moving towards him. Sad and unpleasant.
The third film with sex as a major theme is the French made Pieurves (Water Lilies). The film covers the well worn subject of sexual curiosity and first experience involving two friends one of whom is a lead member in a school age swim formation team. She is waiting in the locker rook for her swimsuit to dry because she forgot to bring a paid of knickers with her when a young man enters, it is not clear why he should do so and she stands up half naked to face him. She is greatly affected by this and stays behind several times naked in the hope he will repeat his entry. When he does not she makes a move entering the male locker room to give him a note. The two become lovers although her interest is more out of curiosity than affection.
In part she reacts to the loss of friendship with her female friend who has fallen in love with the lead female member of another formation swim team. This young woman allows the girl to masturbate her with a hand under bed clothing and later shows the girl what adult kissing is like. There is no more to this first feature film than this. Part from a couple of nude shots of the older girl it is not a film for the voyeur. It is difficult to work out for whom the film is intended or will appreciate other than young girls curious about sexuality.
The fourth film Deep End is also about teenage sex and is a 1970 British West German production Deep End recently shown on TCM uncut. It stars Jane Asher and also provides a role for Diana Doors. The film is about a 15 year old boy who takes a job in a public bath house with swimming pool where the older assistant by some ten years (Jane Asher), explains that they should perform sexual favours for tips.
The boy, Mike, develops a crush on the girl and follows her to the cinema where is watching an X film with her boyfriend. Mike puts a hand over the seat to the girl’s breasts. The boyfriend complains to the manager but the girl kisses Mike while he is away. The police are called. The couple do not press charges and the film theatre manager is told off for allowing a 15 year old into the cinema.
Mike then comes to a strip club with a cardboard cut out of a girl who could be Jane Asher. He visits a brothel but leaves without participating or paying for the drink and times given to him. Later he causes the tyre of the car of the couple to break and during the process of changing tyres she loses the diamond of her engagement ring in the surrounding snow which is collected and taken back to the bath house to melt it.
There are no wall sockets so a light is lowered to get hot water to melt the snow which is placed in the bottom of the empty pool, h finds the diamond and naked he lays in the pool with the diamond in his mouth. She eventually joins him naked get the Diamond and goes to leave. Angered he swings the lamp severely injuring her and a tin of red paint strategically placed mingles with her blood has she dies. He holds her meanwhile an attendant enters and starts to fill the pool, leaving the possibility that Mike will be electrocuted. One can see his appeal of the film in 1970 as the sixties came to an end and for the film to be shown uncut on USA TV is a sign of the times. But what one is tempted to ask what was it all about?
The father leaves the household for work as a manager/owner of a factory complex and arranges all the food and other family needs for the outside world to be met. It is assumed that when professional building and maintenance work has been required the children were kept in isolation until the work is completed.
Mother is primarily responsible for the education of the children and keeps in contact with her husband through a secret telephone. She also has a secret radio. There is a television but the family only watch selected videos in English without subtitles so the parents interpret what is being shown to suit their philosophy.
The film reveals that the children have been taught that the overhead flying planes are the actual size of toys which the parents sometimes give to the children as presents for some achievement claiming that the toys have been real planes which sometimes fall from the sky.
The second belief is the fish they eat originate in their outside swimming pool. The fish are placed in the pool without the children knowing and are then fished for.
The third fostered belief is that cats are vicious creatures that will attack and devour human beings so they must be avoided and if necessary killed if they stray onto the grounds when the secured front gate is opened.
Father has arranged for a dog to be professionally trained and the children are prepared for its arrival being told that their mother will give birth shortly to another child and a dog. They mother will only give birth to the dog if the behaviour of the children improves.
The main focus of the film is the relationship between the son and a female employee of the father who works as a security guard at his factory. He brings her blindfolded home on a regular basis to have clinical sex for which she is paid. She is allowed to have meals with the family and sometimes stays for a while with the sisters before being driven to her home. However she has been briefed not to provide any information which will destroy the illusions about the outside world held by the children.
Bored by the detached sexual act with the son, the visitor persuades one of the daughters to provide oral sex without the girl understanding what she is doing. She is given a headband with stones which are said to light up in the dark. She then gives her sister the headband in exchange for being licked on arm!
The good order of the home becomes dramatically disturbed when one of the daughters blackmails the visitor into giving her two videos in her possession which she views secretly in the middle of the night. These have a profound affect on her behaviour: Jaws and a Ricky film. When she uses the word zombie from one of the films her mother says these are yellow flowers so when a buttercup appears she tells her mother zombies have arrived.
However he turns violent on her brother which leads to the father discovering the involvement of the visitor in the provision of the videos. This leads to father murdering the young woman who lives on her own bashing her head in with a video player. It is then decided that the son will have sex with on of the daughter. He is blindfolded and told to fondle the daughters in bath to select one to be his partner for intercourse. He selects the older and during intercourse it is evident the girl is unhappy at being used in this way; She knocks out one of her Dogsteeth hence the title of the film She gets into the boot of her father’s car. In the morning the family are upset to find the daughter missing. He searches for her. The son and other daughter console each other and kiss. Father drives to work. The girl is left in the boot, apparently unable to get out. The film ends. Make of all this you will!
Sex appears to be at the core of the Danish film Antichrist which I found depressing and incomprehensible yet according to Dr Mark Kermode who introduced the Film Four Extreme season of films most of which I missed this is a major film. The film shocked audiences because of an opening sequence where penetrative intercourse between married adults is shown in close up.
While this is happening their preschool child has opened his bedroom window and is amazed with the falling snow and which is covering the ground. He stretches out to catch the snow and falls to his death. His mother never recovers.
In the first part of the film Chapter one called Grief she moves to an establishment for therapy after failing to respond to psychiatric drugs. The sequence ends with a vision, dream, hallucination in which her husband encounters a dear without fear of him and then he finds a dead fawn in hanging from the womb.
Chapter two is Pain and fear, panic and grief overwhelm the woman. The husband is also the subject of frightening and unpleasant experiences encountering a disembowelling fox which utters “chaos reigns“.
Chapter three is Despair. She wants him to beat her. During sex in the woods roots turn to hands emerging from the soil. The child appears to have had deformed feet at the time of its death and husband finds photos of the child wearing boots on the wrong feet. He becomes even more concerned about the behaviour past and present of his wife, she crushes his testicles.
Chapter four the Three Beggars. Husband asks if his wife wants to kill him. She says not yet, but when the Three beggars arrive someone must die. There is a flashback to the prologue in which she sees what a child is doing and does not act to prevent his fall. She mutilates herself while masturbating. She attempts to kill her husband but he strangles her instead and burns her body on a funeral pyre.
There is an epilogue in which he is returning to cabin eating berries. From the top of the hill he sees he blurred faces if hundreds of women moving towards him. Sad and unpleasant.
The third film with sex as a major theme is the French made Pieurves (Water Lilies). The film covers the well worn subject of sexual curiosity and first experience involving two friends one of whom is a lead member in a school age swim formation team. She is waiting in the locker rook for her swimsuit to dry because she forgot to bring a paid of knickers with her when a young man enters, it is not clear why he should do so and she stands up half naked to face him. She is greatly affected by this and stays behind several times naked in the hope he will repeat his entry. When he does not she makes a move entering the male locker room to give him a note. The two become lovers although her interest is more out of curiosity than affection.
In part she reacts to the loss of friendship with her female friend who has fallen in love with the lead female member of another formation swim team. This young woman allows the girl to masturbate her with a hand under bed clothing and later shows the girl what adult kissing is like. There is no more to this first feature film than this. Part from a couple of nude shots of the older girl it is not a film for the voyeur. It is difficult to work out for whom the film is intended or will appreciate other than young girls curious about sexuality.
The fourth film Deep End is also about teenage sex and is a 1970 British West German production Deep End recently shown on TCM uncut. It stars Jane Asher and also provides a role for Diana Doors. The film is about a 15 year old boy who takes a job in a public bath house with swimming pool where the older assistant by some ten years (Jane Asher), explains that they should perform sexual favours for tips.
The boy, Mike, develops a crush on the girl and follows her to the cinema where is watching an X film with her boyfriend. Mike puts a hand over the seat to the girl’s breasts. The boyfriend complains to the manager but the girl kisses Mike while he is away. The police are called. The couple do not press charges and the film theatre manager is told off for allowing a 15 year old into the cinema.
Mike then comes to a strip club with a cardboard cut out of a girl who could be Jane Asher. He visits a brothel but leaves without participating or paying for the drink and times given to him. Later he causes the tyre of the car of the couple to break and during the process of changing tyres she loses the diamond of her engagement ring in the surrounding snow which is collected and taken back to the bath house to melt it.
There are no wall sockets so a light is lowered to get hot water to melt the snow which is placed in the bottom of the empty pool, h finds the diamond and naked he lays in the pool with the diamond in his mouth. She eventually joins him naked get the Diamond and goes to leave. Angered he swings the lamp severely injuring her and a tin of red paint strategically placed mingles with her blood has she dies. He holds her meanwhile an attendant enters and starts to fill the pool, leaving the possibility that Mike will be electrocuted. One can see his appeal of the film in 1970 as the sixties came to an end and for the film to be shown uncut on USA TV is a sign of the times. But what one is tempted to ask what was it all about?
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