Therese
and Isabelle
The great work on
this subject before Pinter’s Old Times.
Collège du Lys,
where they make them, those lilies that bloom forever.
A mighty score by
Georges Auric.
The
Lickerish Quartet
Let us see what
has been written of this masterpiece.
“But when he gets
serious, he’s making a mistake.” (Roger Ebert)
“Russ Meyer’s
sexploiters find their exact opposites in the work of Metzger.” (Time Out
Film Guide)
“But what about
pornography that grasps for art?” (Slant)
Score
The fashion
photographer and his wife, the ecologist and the convent girl.
In costume they
are a sailor, a nun, a Montana cowboy and a cover girl for Police Gazette.
The joker in the
deck is a telephone repairman.
Winning one for
the team is the whole idea, and if loyalties sway, the point is made.
Critics missed it
of course, this comic tale set in “the Land of Plenty, bordering on Decadence
to the north and Euphoria to the south...”
Naked
Came the Stranger
The comical
affair of a married New York morning-and-evening radio interview host with a
childlike production staffer, also the comical revenge of his wife and
co-hostess.
They mostly
interview bores, a lesbian diet cookbook authoress, a film critic, etc.
The fortuitous ending is by way of Hutton’s X, Y and Zee.
Directed by Metzger as Henry Paris, from the best-selling novel
written by professionals to debunk the best-selling novel.
The
Image
A drama of the
literary life.
The writer
wrestles with his craft and deadlines. At one of those dreadful cocktail
parties (the scene is Paris), he meets an old acquaintance, a dominatrix with a
nearly perfect mistress. Perfection means no punishment.
The writer is
allowed to share this slave in various ways (cp. Welles’ Hearts of Age),
but having the girl causes a break.
The girl departs,
who should knock on the writer’s door but the acquaintance?
A sublime work,
turning De Sade to account in the very best of all possible worlds.
The
Cat and the Canary
“Greed and power.
That’s what it’s all about.”
A very simple
affair of inheritance and envy. The New York Times (Richard F. Shepard)
cocked a snook at it, there is no other word, and precisely missed the boat.
There is a
pleasant echo of Capra’s Arsenic and Old Lace in the two Army maniacs
carving up their victims, who are manacled and dog-collared in a chair designed
for less sanguinary experiments.
The genius of The
Lickerish Quartet has a miraculous ease with the projection of a filmed
will and is always on the spot with sharp glancing characterizations where a
touch or two gives the surface and the rest is slowly revealed in constant
motion.