everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Brilliant and touching

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

I expected some piece of fluff along the lines of "Emanuele" but this goes farther, alighting somewhere on the border of soft-core and hard porn.It's the story of Francesco Casale, a handsome young professor of literature, and his wife, Katarina Vasilissa, and his rivalry with his bed-ridden father, Raffaella Offidani. Its from a story by Alberto Moravia and it carries with it plenty of Freudian overtones. Casale's wife has left him and is having an affair with another man. The other man turns out to be his own father. Casale begs Vasilissa to occupy a room with him where they can be alone and she agrees to return to him but only if they move into his father's apartment. Something like that.Not that the plot matters. The whole movie is ridden with sex. The nudity and simulated intercourse in "Emmanuelle" were peanuts compared to this. Every male has an erection, even if it's a plastic prosthesis. Even the Chinese waiters in the restaurants pretend to drop a napkin for a chance to peek up someone's skirt. When was the last time you met a salacious Chinese waiter? The women are naked at least as often as the men, and they're good looking too. Vasilissa looks a lot like Tiger Wood's wife. And the servant, Fausta, is extremely careless about her dress. Tinto Brass never fails to take advantage to interrupt a piece of dialog by inserting a shot down the front of Fausta's blouse or Vasilissa's plump rear end as she bends over.Frontal nudity abounds. The women don't shave, so Casale is able to describe his wife's hirsuite pundendum as "the hackles of a wildcat" and "the crest of a rooster." Sometimes Brass goes to far as to give the audience a glimpse of what Casale describes as "the pale and pink seashell," borrowing the line from Stefane Mallarme, the French poet.It falls just short of hard core pornography because there are no money shots, as they're called, and no close ups of organs at work. The Washington Monument does not meet the Holland Tunnel on screen.Well, it may approach hard core but it never scores a touchdown. The story itself is always hovering in the background and isn't itself uninteresting. And the performers make an attempt at acting. Casale himself isn't bad, a sympatico figure. Vasilissa, with her generous bosom and hefty rear, might be more comfortable inside the covers of Playboy. I haven't read Moravia's story but I doubt that Offidani, as the older patient with the broken leg, is supposed to be quite as obnoxious as he's played.The sex is a problem because it's so blatant that it overwhelms a story that might be involving. It's distracting. There probably should have been more of it -- more explicit -- or just the suggestion of it. As it stands, it diverts the attention without informing the narrative. I mean, after all, as grown ups we KNOW what's going on. We don't need to be shown it. And if we ARE to be shown it, well then let's see it.

I have never seen an erotic movie like this before, nor have I ever found any to be as satisfying, even though I had to put up with English subtitles. The Tinto Brass perspective on female anatomy is quite uncommon in American porn.Instead of numerous scenes of topless skinny women with fake boobs, Tinto gives us a good look at some rather curvaceous derrières and, for variation, a few close-up views of women self stimulating some rather hairy vaginas. While breasts aren't the main focus, and they aren't the biggest boobs you've seen, they do appear natural! You should also note that male anatomy is revealed more in this film than in soft porn; there a many close up shots of male penises in female hands. Unlike hardcore, however, fellatio is not depicted, nor does the camera zoom in on penetration. I especially liked the fact that there is no semen or feces, staples of some hardcore films which disgust me.As in many erotic stories, the basic idea is to show a clear contrast between the intimacy of true love and the moral depravation of lust and wanton sex, in this case with the spotlight on voyeurism. To paraphrase the principal male character, Dodo, voyeurism is more than an idle spectator's indulgence of his/her lustful desires. It is a mutual endeavor to lay bare intimate sexual secrets in all their carnal essence and vulnerability, a revolt against a hypocritical society that represses a vital part of life out of pure ignorance. While this may be well stated, the film fails to prove this point with its numerous unrealistic scenes of people acting shamelessly in both public and private settings.Love is portrayed by the relationship between Dodo and his wife Silvia. In a playful foreplay scene, Silva dresses in front of Dodo, allowing us to get a good look at Katarina Vasilissa, a very pretty, tall blond. Her 23 years at the time of shooting stood up well to close inspection from the camera. She acted reasonably well, and the sex between her and Dodo appears intimate, however, I wasn't left with the impression that she was truly in love. This may be the reason the film only earned a rating of 6.Moral depravation is portrayed by the relationship between Dodo's father and his nurse, Fausta, whom he hires more for sexual favors than for medical treatment. This humorous part of the story is too slapstick for my taste. A forgivable flaw, however, since Tinto gives you a good feel for Christina Garavaglia's well rounded buttocks! As for the overall production, what I liked most was the Jazz music soundtrack. On the other hand, most settings were rather mundane, and I didn't like the lighting at all. It wasn't consistent from scene to scene, and all too often the characters were set against a bright background, which actually makes it harder to see them clearly.So, to sum it up, if well rounded buttocks and hairy vaginas are your thing, if you want plenty of sex without going hardcore, and if you find tall blonds attractive, than this film may be worth a look.

Buxom women,faithful husbands,uncanny atmosphere,strange _aggressivity and twisted desire,perverts ....One of the best five erotic movies ever made.There are persons whose creativity is a constant source of delight for their admirers; plus, they have the advantage ,or the constitutive gift of the large—scale. They create MANY fine, satisfying things. Their creativity is sometimes uneven; in this we see but a sign that it's an organic fact. Their less—successful things reveal to analysis the secret of the failure—it is that factor ,or that.You can't lie yourself about these things. You can't cheat. You like the man as expressed in his creativity, in his reflection, in his objective thought, in his achievements. It's the most obvious thing; you begin by noticing it. There are nonetheless the works, the achievements themselves that you admire, that you savor ,and not 'the man' (who would be a mere abstraction if considered otherwise than the mind that created those plentifully pleasing things).This is how I feel about Brass (and also about a few others—firstly Welles, Giuseppe Patroni Griffi, Hitchcock, etc.).These persons mean movies. It's a primary fact—the mere concreteness of it guides the thought. I came to know Brass' movies when I was 18. He has been since one of the few directors whose work is a source of immediate interest for me—on my side of life, hither, hereby. Speaking about his best movies (he has some flops too, this is here beside the point) I never need to plead ;I simply indicate the qualities of his movies.The one here is among his very best films. Very atmospheric, very interesting. The woman--Katarina Vasilissa-- is maybe Brass' most beautiful gift to its admirers. This is a wonderful thing with Brass—some speak about dirty desires, etc.. Yet with Brass there is something almost touching and worthy in the act of some men looking between an actress' legs—it's not dirty, it's not phony. Brass, pushing the things, gave, paradoxically, its human dimension to the act of watching erotic films.He is not the only one to have done that. Yet he is perhaps the best, and the most conspicuous and famous. He situated the fact in its own terms; he stated it correctly. He knew what a certain audience want; he aimed exactly, and he gave that audience what was needed. Watching an erotic film is watching a (faked, usually) sexual act; or looking between an actress' legs. Well, Brass gave this activity its true and human and concrete dimensions.There are voyeurs and spies in his films. The sexual act is spied, watched. Yet this remains within the confines of the humans. In Brass' films, the voyeurism is the act of a pervert; yet this pervert is rightly situated, if I may say so.Francesco Casale spies Katarina Vasilissa in The Voyeur.In La Chiave, the old husband spies his horny wife—while she pisses, or while she's in the bathtub, or simply as she sleeps. An image enjoyed by Brass is that of the woman pissing; and this may be, indeed, a fine show. Serena Grandi is seen, watched pissing in Miranda (1985). Stefania Sandrelli is seen pissing in The Key. In Senso '45 (2002) Anna Galiena pisses after a sexual act (a very healthy habit, it prevents infections).This is correlated with Brass' huge appetite for the derrières of his actresses.It looks like Katarina Vasilissa didn't really make a career in the cinema. That's too bad. Brass worked with several able actresses (Mme Sandrelli, Mme Grandi, Mme Galiena, etc.); Katarina Vasilissa isn't one of them. But she is outstanding. Brass explores the huge _expressivity of her naked body. For me, Katarina is a legend, and a cult actress. And I can say the same things about her colleague in this movie, the strikingly beautiful Cristina Garavaglia. She deserved a real career. Yet the number of the movies made by these two actresses is certainly irrelevant, since they had the chance of making one of the best ten erotic films ever. (To give a counterexample, Mme. Kristel has an impressive career—yet she NEVER had the chance of such a film.)The Voyeur has a certain dreamy look, a dreamy feel, enhanced by Brass flair for the grotesque and the bizarre _expressivity. Brass' cinematographic styles reaches here one of its richest moments. The Voyeur is a peak, and a feast of Brass style.In Brass' films, the woman is essentially a mistress; if she's a wife, she's a depraved, horny one. On the other hand, in Brass' movies the husbands have an insatiable lust for their wives. They do indeed ceaselessly desire their women. In various movies, Mmes. Sandrelli, Vasilissa, Galliena have husbands that intensely desire them; while Mme. Grandi will get one at the final of her "Miranda". The male is the one who desires and sexually adores his wife.The cinema was invented to make films like Brass' The Voyeur.

The story of erotic films in the 1990s is largely a very sad one. American main stream cinema seems to avoid the subject altogether, B movies are obsessed with coupling sex with violence and death, and the typical porno is as exciting as drying paint. But there are a few exceptions, most notably the films of Tinto Brass, and this film here is a prime example.What is so unique about Brass' films of this decade (and to a slightly lesser degree his 1980s films as well) is how they manage to combine eroticism with an explicitness that is close to hardcore porn, and that without ever looking seedy or overly stylish. Greatly supporting this effect are the music of Riz Ortolani and the excellent cinematography by Massimo Di Venanzo. With L'Uomo che guarda Brass seems to be telling the porno makers: "this is how a sex film can and should look like".The UK certificated version of this is about 8 minutes shorter than the original, but even that version would have no chance of an R rating in the USA. The quality of the English dubbing is a bit better than usual, but still we have to endure the traditional incomprehensible fake American accent for the leading male as in so many Italian films.